


The Shields We Carry

by omenest



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon-Typical Violence, Enemies to Lovers, Eventual Relationships, F/M, Kinda, Mentions of Anxiety, Mentions of PTSD, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Post-Canon Fix-It, Slow Burn, enemies is a loose term
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-09
Updated: 2020-03-26
Packaged: 2021-01-26 11:07:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 30,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21373138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/omenest/pseuds/omenest
Summary: Emotions have always come easy you, almost too easy. They build and burn and twist. But they can also isolate people from everyone around them. You are running from a past of mistakes, finding yourself in the last place you ever wanted to be. A life as a hero might not have been meant for you but its where you find yourself. Maybe you can't be the hero that saves the world, but you can help rebuild the ones that do.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Reader
Comments: 4
Kudos: 47





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This first part is kinda short, but I already had the next couple up and ready to go. This story is pretty self indulgent and something I've been needing to get out of my head for a while. Tags may change as I get further in the story, but I will always give a heads up if there is violence or explicit content in the chapter.
> 
> I would love to have constructive feedback!

For a secret compound, it was a brutish concrete slab that stood in total juxtaposition to the rest of the greenery around it. The much more gentle, rolling hills in the distance seemed to be trying to run from the otherwise dead structure. You figured that pretty much anyone flying overhead would notice the thing. It was exactly inconspicuous.  
  
The black SUV pulled around the winding road to the front entrance, coming to a smooth idle. The effect was very much Fury’s style. Calm, cool, and collected. Nothing was done without thought and planning. His normal nonchalant attitude crept off of him, not imposing in anyway but simply a reminder that he was there. He was one of the few people who didn’t overwhelm you after being around them for a while. 

He let out a small huff, “Alright, this is home sweet home. Hope you like it.” 

His tone gave nothing away about how he felt about this arrangement. You had come to him for help and he did what he did. You hadn’t expected to be given three suitcases and told to pack in the middle of the night. You really hadn’t expected the incognito jet he had walked you onto. But most surprising of all was that he hadn’t pressed you at all for details in the several hours you had spent together. He was never one to not have all the information.

Part of you suspected that whatever remained of SHIELD had been keeping tabs on you. That even following the Snap you hadn’t flown under any radar. Half the population disappears, and it just makes you more visible. Not just to SHIELD remnants, but other groups who would love to get their hands-on unique individuals. It didn’t help that you had accidentally fallen into a Hydra offshoots line of sight right after the Snap. You had been trying to help people until the world went sideways and you became a wanted target. 

Asking Fury for help had been your last intention. You didn’t want to become one of “The World’s Mightiest Heroes” poster children and you didn’t want to be involved with whatever remained of them. They had tried to help the world, but in doing so had sent out a homing beacon for bad things. Superheroes were meant for comics, not real life. The Avengers and X-men and whatever ever other renegade groups existed tended to show up and level cities, while posing under the guise of helping. Yet, when two men had cornered you in the elevator for your apartment building, you had accepted that maybe you needed to disappear from the world for a while. And it seemed like Fury was good at making people disappear. 

Fury had briefed you on the jet with very basic rules, “You are being given the same option many others have taken. Its an evacuation plan. You don’t exist to the outside world anymore and you can’t return to your old life. In taking this offer, you’re giving up the chance at the normal apple pie life you might have dreamed up at one point.” He had looked up at you, trying to drill into you that this decision was permanent. There was no going back. “You are also going to be exposed to things that otherwise aren’t real for the rest of the world. There are things the world knows and then there's the truth. You are not the only person who has chosen to take this evacuation option. If you ever pose any threat to the others who have been given this option. You will be taken care of.” He punctuated the threat by dropping a manila file in your lap. 

“So, I get to know the worlds deep dark secrets just like that?” You asked casually. You followed his movements around the hull of the jet, watching as he settled in a seat across from yours. 

“Clever. This isn’t just a place to hide, its a job. So no,” he said simply, then closed his eye and leaned his head against the headrest. Effectively ending the conversation for the rest of the flight. 

Now you glance out the deeply tinted windows of the SUV at the imposing building. The same file was still in your lap. You hadn’t bothered to look at it on the jet, whatever was in it could be dealt with later. 

Setting your jaw, you opened the door of the car and stepped out onto the seamless pavement. Fury followed your movements, heading to the trunk to start pulling out your suitcases. The whole thing feeling oddly reminiscent of being a child after your parents died in mysterious circumstances. Resulting in you being tossed into a failing foster care system. You were an okay kid, very quiet and reserved, but trouble had stuck to you like a leach. 

Throughout school you were described by teachers as a pleasure to have in class, but they would like to see you interact with your classmates more. The truth was, you had empathic abilities. You could feel other people’s emotions. Sometimes their intentions. School had been overwhelming. But you had tested well and made it into a good college. Your abilities flying under the radar, you made sure never to give yourself away. 

During high school, superheroes or gifted individuals had become more prevalent. Captain America had been found in the ice. Tony Stark proclaimed himself Iron Man. More and more unique people appeared into the world’s view. But it resulted in larger and more dangerous fights. Maybe being super lead to a sense of responsibility to the world. You just had never felt it. Instead, dread had seeped into you, making hiding your abilities more and more appealing.

Your abilities weren’t super strength. They weren’t combative in any way. But they could help you to help others. In college psychology courses grabbed your attention. They helped to explain what you felt in others and to understand yourself better. After years you gained an undergraduate in psychology, then a masters of counseling. While your talents let you feel what someone else was feeling, they didn’t give explanations to anything. You still had to put in the work to help. You just could empathize.

You had been getting ready to start a doctorate program when the Snap had happened. That's when things went to shit. As a social worker at the time, you had thrown yourself into trying to assist the people who remained. It had been four months after the Snap that you had come across a gifted child. Someone had reported seeing a child who could heal themselves in an abandoned district of the city. Thats when the Hydra off-shoot had shown up. A child with healing capabilities would be exploited in their hands. You had put yourself between the agents and the kid and…... And at the end of it the two of you walked away. You made the connections, through the remainder of SHIELD, with what remained of the X-men and passed the child to them. 

Since then you had been running. In a half empty world, it had been easy to slip in and out of lives. To pick up and move when you needed. You lent your counseling and social worker expertise where you could. Trying to help in small ways, but you never stayed in one place for long. It wasn’t an option, someone always showed up looking for you. You had done a rather great job at painting a large, neon target on your forehead. 

After the Snap had been reversed, with everyone returning, the world became smaller. it no longer operated in the small communities it had for those five years. As a whole everyone was trying to return to what life had been before. For those that had disappeared it seemed a lot easier to just fall in line. For those who lived through it, it caused a lot of trauma. You had found a job trying to help those who needed to find a way to readjust. You lead group therapies, along with individual sessions. It was during one of the group sessions that the two men had shown up. Then they followed you home. Then they walked in the building with you and.… And at the end of it all you walked out alone, dialing the number for Fury. 

For early fall, the air was cold, it probably had something to do with the gray blanket of clouds blocking out the sun. The trees hadn’t started turning yet but they would soon. You shivered a little looking at the building. Turning to Fury you asked, “So do I get to know who’s actually alive? You can't really just be dropping me off by myself in Stark’s old home.” 

Fury laughed and shook his head, “He never lived here. He built it as a training center.” 

“Oooh, so it’s a factory to produce more supers,” you quipped at him. “Weren’t there enough?” 

“Stark was doing what he thought was right,” was all he replied with. 

You squint at the building, “Isn’t that what he had said about Ultron,” you huffed under your breathe. 

Fury set the last suitcase on the ground, pulling up the handle and passing it to you. He waltzed you, walking towards the wide glass doors. They opened soundlessly into a foyer with larger steel looking, double doors. Overhead a female voice sounded, “Identification please?” 

“Fury,” he said shortly. With that the second set of doors opened into a larger room. You followed him, turning at the last moment to look backwards as the steel stung shut. For a moment you felt like dropping the suitcase and making a run for it. Your heart pounded in your chest. This was the life you had wanted to avoid. You had done everything you could to not be pulled into the superhero chaos. To not expose yourself. But now you were willing walking into it, in some way. Walking right into mistake. You felt like you had just taken a step into a life you weren’t going to be able to walk away from. 

In your moment of panic, you missed the entrance of a woman. 

“Hello, you must be Y/N,” greeted a woman with tired eyes, a practiced smile, and red hair. Like Fury, she had a practiced air about her. Nothing in her posture or demeanor would give any secret away about who she was. Yet, you could feel the gentle waves of melancholy ebbing off of her. It was nothing overwhelming, just an old kind of sad that had turned into a habit for her to carry around. She was beautiful, her deep red hair fell past her shoulders in a tight braid. In between crimson locks, strands of a false blonde peaked through.  
  
“Romanoff,” Fury nodded his head in your direction, “this is the one I’m handing over to you.” The simple sentence might as well have been a punch straight to the gut. How many times had a very similar interaction happened between a case worker and a kind but overwhelmed foster parent? Each time you have been relocated the interaction seemed more tired and tense. It was always accompanied by the case worker promising that the problems from the last home wouldn’t continue here. That this was a much better fit. Here you were standing with all your things in a few bags, being handed over to someone else to care for. That someone wasn’t just a regular foster parent. 

Romanoff. The Widow. You had read the files that had been made public some years back, but you were sure that they didn’t contain everything about this woman either. This was the world's deadliest woman standing in front of you, smiling kindly. Nothing about her suggested that she was the same person who had eliminated governments and shifted the outcomes of wars. The brilliant Black Widow. Not only that, but as far as the outside world was concerned, she had not made it through the battle with Thanos. There she was in the flesh. Memorial services had been held across the globe following the war. Everyone mourned for the heroes they had wanted looked up only a few years before. The irony of it all.

Dark eyes landed on your face, taking in your features. She was a truly stunning woman, like someone had sculpted her from clay and let her come to life. Insecurity creep up your throat, mixing with your other fears and past memories. She was looking at you, but part of her seemed to be thousands of miles away.

You lifted your arm, it felt like dead weight, offering your hand to her, “Um, ye-yes. I am Y/N. It's nice to meet you- ?” The sentence ended in an awkward question that fell out of your mouth. 

She smiled politely while taking your hand and finished your faux pas with, “Natasha.” Your headed bobbed up and down on its own accord, you felt trapped in between a child version of yourself and the current version of yourself. 

“I do have a very busy schedule and am afraid its my time to leave,” Fury started, turning towards you and offered his own hand to you, “You know how to reach me if you need too.” With that he walked to the doors, looking back over his shoulder coolly adding, “Do not need too.” 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, its a little slow, but things will start picking up from here!

Natasha and you watched as he walked back out the large double doors. More so now, you felt just like a small child dropped off in some place you were never going to belong. She coughed at you side, catching your attention, “I figured you might want to know where you’re sleeping? We can talk about the other stuff when you are settled in.” Part of you wondered what the other stuff would be, while another part was entering a full panic mode. Your feet kept up with Natasha for you, your hands pulling a suitcase and holding on the file Fury had given you. Maybe you should have looked in it while you had been on the jet. What had you missed? What had you walked into? 

As you moved further into the building, you were hit by how crypt-like it felt. Simple can-lights dotted the ceiling, casting cold white light on the concrete walls and floors. The two of you passed a few rooms that held no furniture or any real belongings. There was nothing on the walls, other than a sparse amount of large black doors. They most likely lead to other rooms, but Natasha didn’t offer any information and you didn’t ask. At last she turned a corner and came to a small hallway with one of the said doors at the end.   
She looked back at you, “This will be your room. It has an on-suit bathroom. There's not a lot in there- “ again a wave of sadness rolled off her, “but I hope it's enough to get you started.” 

“I’m sure it’s more than I had in my last place, it was shithole,” you tried to joke, hoping to break up the tension you felt. A small, but real, smile flashed across her face. She pushed the door open and stood back to let you into the room first, which lead to a small hallway that opened into a larger room beyond that. Like the rest of the building, the walls, floor, and ceiling were concrete. The far wall through had two very large windows that only had a foot of concrete from the floor, ceiling, and each other between them. If the world outside hadn’t also been a gray fall day, then it might have brought some life into the room. Instead it seemed to make the gray feel more overwhelming. 

As you moved further into the room you notice a small dip in the wall to your left that you figured led to the bathroom. A bed appeared to you right. It was unmade, but a pilled of sheets and a folded comforter sat waiting on the mattress. There were simple black night stands on either side, each with their own lamps. On the wall next to the bed was a large dresser. A very simple round mirror hung over it. It was the only sign of any decoration that you had noticed since you walked in. Across the room on the opposite wall a simple glass desk and black chair stood against another plain wall. 

“It’s-,” you tried to find words to compliment the space. 

Natasha laughed, “It’s boring and empty, but you can decorate it as you like. It’s yours now.” She tried again to give you a smile to ease your nerves, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes. 

“I appreciate it. I know you didn’t have to take me in. This can't be a normal situation for you,” you try to make it sound like you weren’t itching to run from this place and never look back. Even if you did run, where the hell would you go. There was a giant target plastered on your back. 

“We try to help where we can, even if it’s in small ways,” she replied simply. 

“So, there are other people here?” 

“Yes. The facility operates as a home for a few of us. But mostly its base of operations for what’s left of SHIELD and the Avengers Initiative,” she didn’t seem to feel like the information she was going was some secret. It was strange to hear someone claim such things though. Even with the Avengers activities, most of them had remained private figures, outside of Tony Stark. When they first came into the limelight, they all had been powerful people in costumes who saved the day. Each of their everyday identities had not been publicized, instead if they showed up in the news or in papers, they were referred to by their superhero names and pictured in their costumes. 

That was until the fall of SHIELD. Then, not only were each of the Avengers names and personal information leaked, but so were the more covert agents. You could remember the uproar that had fallen over the world. People openly criticized people for their involvement with the Avengers or SHIELD. Even though both had sacrificed so much to do good, they had done damage too. Sensitive information had been thrown into the light. And it had been done by the woman standing in front of you. She had compromised herself to expose an even bigger threat. 

“Is SHIELD a thing still?” You asked. Not to pry but maybe to just understand what you were getting involved with. 

“No, SHIELD was compromised. Fury has spent that last couple of years since it fell to rebuild an intelligence network that we can trust. What is left of them and the Avengers- “ her tone dipping, “ is what remains here. Most people who work here are only ever in the East wing. Those of us who have a somewhat permanent residence live here in the West wing.” 

You nod your head to indicate your paying attention, “I am assuming I only have access to this side of the building then? Like I’m Belle in Beauty and the Beast.”   
“For now, but we want to talk to you about training. Fury said you have a gift of some sort? If you live here, then you need to be prepared to help the person next to you. It’s a team effort.” 

The air rushed from your lungs, you weren’t a fighter, and you hadn’t signed up to be hero, “Woah hold on. I think you’re on a different page than I am. I’m not a…. an anything actually. I was a therapist. Not a fighter. I’m here to stay out of the line of fire. Not run into it! I am one hundred percent against being a bullet sponge!” Your throat felt like it was closing, causing the end of your word vomit to come out squeaky. 

“Like I said,” Natasha repeated laughing a bit, “It’s a team effort. And we aren’t going to throw you in the deep end and watch you sink. You just need to be ready if something happens. And your talents could be used for a lot of good. We would like to bring you on as an advisor and a team member. Definitely not a bullet sponge.” 

“Well, that alone clears up all of my fears. Not like there are several other kinds of sponges I would wish not to be,” you snapped back. 

Her lipped quirked up at one side in a small smile, “We have records of your activity following the Snap. You are a person who goes out of their way to help. And it seems like you are underestimating yourself. Give it a shot? If it’s awful, then we will find you a remote village in Italy to spend the rest of your life in.” It almost sounded like she was joking and with the way her eyes lit up a little you caught on. “Training starts at 8 AM tomorrow morning. Please do not be late, he tends to get a little antsy if you’re late.”   
With that she turned and walked out of your room, leaving you still wondering what you had walked into.   
“Wait!” You called after her, “Who the hell is ‘he’?”

—————————   
  
The mattress was new, never used, and extremely uncomfortable. Or maybe it was just you who was uncomfortable in the massive, hollow building. After Natasha had left, you spent a small amount of time trying to settle in. You had wondered into the bathroom, which had large shower with spaceship looking controls. You knew for a fact that you would be either freezing yourself or burning the skin off you back the first few times you try to use it. A simple marble counter was recessed into the wall opposite the shower. The lighting of the bathroom made the gray walls a few shades closer to white, but it still felt cold. It didn’t belong to you. There were two closets with doors on either side of the doorway into the bathroom. One was set up to be a linen closet, with large while towels already folded and placed neatly on the middle shelf. The other had simple black hangers pushed all to one side of a rail, you assumed it was meant for hanging clothing. Everything felt like someone had tried to get the bare bones of what a room needed in it but hadn’t stop to consider what someone might want in it. There wasn’t even toilet paper on the holder, and none in either closet or under the sink. 

Wandering around the empty building sounded like the exact opposite of a great time, but you also figured that you should find toilet paper now before you really needed it. Opening the door was the first step. The next fifteen or so steps were just repeating step one until you found the tp. Not exactly how you imagined your first couple of hours in a secret base to be, but then again you never envisioned yourself in any situation like the one you were in.   
  
Door number thirty-six was the one. It was a supply closet some number of turns from your room, but you had found it. In your exploration you had found several other rooms. One had been a large open space that you figured might have been intended to be a living area. A wall had what looked like the set up for a tv or large screen, while the one next to it had floor to ceiling windows overlooking the manicured lawns and a small lake. A room next to that was also empty, but about the size for a nice formal dining room. There was kitchen across the hall from the two before it. While the bones of a nice living space existed, everything in the building was closed off from each other. It was like someone had tried to turn an office building into a living space but given up halfway through. 

You also had figured out that the West wing, was rather small in comparison to the rest of the building. The other wing must have made up the majority of the building impressive street front view. There was an elevator and a set of stairs, both of which you were too worried about venturing into. Whatever was upstairs, it wasn’t something you needed to figure out tonight. Instead you oriented yourself back to the kitchen in search of food. It was an impressive space, with a larger double oven and stove top. Marble counters spread across the room and over the island and breakfast bar. Three lone barstools were neatly pushed into the counter. For how well equipped it was, there was almost no food in it. The fridge was filled with mostly raw vegetables and fruits, but little else. Most of the cabinets were empty, only the two by the fridge being filled with what you had stocked your college dorm room with. Peanut butter, jelly, bread, and a few other miscellaneous items. Nothing really to cook with. In a lower cabinet by the stove, you found pots and pans that hadn’t been unpacked. Everything was close to being what a place needed to be lived in, but not quite.   
  
You made a sandwich and tried to find your room. In the hour or so you had been walking around you hadn’t seen anyone else, not even Natasha again. When you had gotten back to your room you noticed that someone had left a tablet on your desk along with a note in beautiful, practiced marks, “this is yours, it will help keep you connected with everyone else in the building. -Natasha” There wasn’t much on it, a few files and an email inbox with one email telling you were to find the training gym for the morning, also sent by Natasha. Deciding that maybe just sleeping for a couple of hours would be smart instead of getting caught up trying to put things away, you made the bed and laid down, hoping that drifting off to sleep would be easier than you imagined.   
  
——————————   
  
Despite the wonderful directions that Natasha had sent you, it just so happens that each concrete hallway looked like each other. In a desperate attempt to be early, you stumbled into the training gym only a minute late. A crowd of maybe ten people stood in the middle of a matted floor. A distance track looped the diameter of the room, with varying forms of exercise equipment in the middle. Some of the contraptions looked like typical weight training things, but one large metal structure in the middle you could only describe as a jungle gym on steroids. Various ropes and bars hung on it. 

Feeling extremely intimidated by the large room and the fact that every person in the center of it was looking at you. To add to the pressure, one very large and very pissed off man stood in the middle. You had known that walking into this you would be facing people everyone thought was dead. But to see America’s poster boy standing in front of you was startling. Like Natasha, the world had been led to believe that he had not made it out of their last encounter with Thanos. You wonder how many other fallen heroes and simply decided to slip into the shadows. 

“You’re late,” he ground out without even really looking your way. His eyes were trained on a tablet in his hand. 

Your eyes searched for a clock, two minutes past eight, “I had trouble finding my way here-“ The sentenced died in your throat as the man flicked piercing, blue eyes at you. Nothing about his face held the soft kindnesses that Natasha’s had the night before. He looked like someone had placed ice into the middle of his face. Adding to the effect you felt the annoyance rolling off of him. 

“Three miles. Its ten laps for a mile. Thirty laps, no stops, go.” 

Your mouth fell open gaping, “B-but I literally didn’t know how to get here! And I was only a fucking minute late, so maybe fucking chill out?” You cringed instantly when the feeling of annoyance turned into something much more sinister. He dropped the tablet on the mat, causing it to bounce dully, and sauntered up to you, “Six miles. Ten laps a mile. Sixty laps, no stopping, go,” the sentence ended with him practically growling at you. 

Not being one to be pushed around, you bit your tongue from snapping back at him. Natasha’s red hair stood out in the group behind him, just past his broad shoulders, her eyes pleading with you to not continue the fight. Huffing, you duck your head and maneuver towards the track. Under your breathe you had let out, “Sir yes sir.” A very small part of you hoped he could hear it. 

Just as quickly as you had grabbed his attention, he was focused on the other people standing on the mats with him. He called out names, seeming to pair them up. Each pair were given specific instructions for a guided work out and sparing routine. None of them had so much a looked at you, instead opting to have kept their backs to you, intently listening to the orders they were being given. You dreaded the very obvious punishment you had been given. Running was a skill in your opinion, not really something everyone can pick up. It was one that you had not only not managed to pick up, but completely lost track of it. Three laps were all it took for the burning to set in. Fire moved across your shins, up your body, and settled firmly in your lungs. By the end of the first mile, you are completely certain that you will die before you get to mile three. 

During your Herculean trial, both Natasha and Captain Headass keep their combined focus on the people in the center of the gym. Part of you knew that disobeying the orders to keep running would result, without any doubt, in more punishments. But at that point you didn’t really care. Your feet slowed under you and you tried to pause to breath.  
You had not been stopped for more than a second and the words, “NO STOPPING,” echoed across the empty room. Now every set of eyes was on you. You felt a sense of embarrassment rush up your neck. It tinged your face and chest and even deeper red than the running had made you. 

The rest of your excruciating morning followed the same pattern; run, fire in the lung, die, get yelled at, repeat. Some part of you suspected that you had been given this punishment because he thought you couldn’t do it. And you’d be damned if you were going to prove him right. Nearly six miles in, you weren’t exactly present in your body anymore, just simply trying to get to the end. The others that had been at the morning training had left at some point, you hadn’t paid much attention as to when. The only person remaining in the room with you was Natasha. Her eyes tracked you, trying to make the judgement call of it you had died, and your body just kept going, or not.

Crossing the stupid marker on the floor, signaling you last lap was over, might have been the greatest achievement of your life. And you had a master's degree. Your body gave out, resulting in you slumping to the floor, ending up on you back almost dry heaving. 

Natasha’s silhouette appeared over you, her eyes tracked something in the distance, “I told you not to be late.” 

“You also didn’t tell me he quite literally was America’s ass,” you spit out at her. Her lips quirked up, but you could tell she was trying not to laugh at your comment. “Who spit in his fucking coffee?” you groaned out, rolling up into a sitting positioned on the floor. 

“Steve has a right to be angry,” was her only response, like it excused his cruel and unusual punishment. The statement might have been general, or her way of saying it was your fault.

“So, he gets off by taking it out on others? Some hero,” you growl while rubbing your calves. The knots forming there were going to be lifelong companions of yours, you could already tell. 

Natasha looked at you finally, “No, just those who show up late to training. I thought you were good with emotions. Surely you knew you were pissing him off.” Her tone was a little sharp, conveying the fact that you had crossed a line. Sure, she was the first person you knew here, and person number two was shaping out to be your least favorite to ever exist, but that didn’t necessarily mean you two were friends either. 

Pausing in your ministrations on your legs, you look up at her, “I am good with emotion. I can tell, but that doesn’t mean I’m good at keeping mine in check. I’m human too, it's natural to react when someone else is being hostile.” 

“You can’t just be human here, you have to be more,” her reply carried a very heavy connotation, that you weren’t quite sure you understood. “He’s not as bad as you might think. Give him a chance.” 

“Right after he gives me one.” 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a little but more happening here! Hope you enjoy!

That night you had woken up from charley-horses off and on. Every fiber in your legs screamed when you moved, but you made it to training ten minutes early the next day. For a week you suffered through training routines that you very obviously were not ready for. Endurance Monday, weights on Tuesday, sparring focus on Wednesday, and so on. Each day you moved through circuits for the training, but each had a specific focus. 

The others training with you never talked, some grunted or cussed under their breathe at times, but they never uttered a full sentence. Most of them looked to be you age, early-twenties to mid-thirties. All of them were field agents of some kind. You had picked that detail up in from some of the instructions Steve would occasionally call out to a person in the group. Which meant all of them were leaps and bounds ahead of you in ability and fitness. Diving headfirst into a very intensive work out schedule wasn’t doing your body any favors you had not time to rest or recover from the day before, because you were always in the next day doing more damage to your aching muscles. 

Not only were you physically being drained every morning, but after being ripped to shreds with Steve, Natasha would show up and drag you to intel training. Those sessions had some of the same people from the fitness group in there with you, but it also had other that you hadn’t seen anywhere else. 

Fitness training was horrible, but the intel portion was almost worse. You were thrown in blind to what was going on. It was even more clear there how much you were lacking in comparison to the people around you. Most the sessions started with a file being dropped in front of you which you weren’t meant to memorize in ten minutes. This followed by the file being removed and as whole you had to work out how to accomplish the various tasks or missions. Natasha rode you ass just as hard during training as Steve did. She never let you slide under the radar and let the rest carry the planning of missions. 

It felt like drowning honestly. You couldn’t keep your head above water in any situation you were put in. Steve railed you for every wrong movement and Natasha called you out on every wrong decision. The agents around you never commented on your very lack-luster performance, but you did notice that in the rare moments of down time they would speak to each other in hush tones. No one ever made the effort to include you.   
The isolation of being surrounded by people, but no one really paying any attention started messing with you head. Even when you weren’t training you were alone. The West wing remained empty of people besides you, to your knowledge. At first you had assumed that Steve and Natasha lived on the upper floor that you had never looked around, but even then, you should have run into them at some point. Like when you found yourself trying to scrape together something to eat in the barren kitchen. You never saw them not working. It seemed like they never stopped. 

In hopes of building yourself a life raft, so maybe you'd top drowning at some point, you spend your lonely nights going over intel files on your tablet. Not just the ones you reviewed in the training sessions, but any that you could get access to. You had found one large file marked The Avengers Initiative one night. In it where the names, alias, and current operative status of the member of the Avengers. Surprise made you pause for a moment at you were able to access this information. Looking up you eyed the large file that hadn't moved from your desk since you moved in. The one Fury had dropped in your lap and told you too read. 

Flipping it open, the same title The Avengers Initiative stood out on the front page. He had been giving the information you had been asking him, but you hadn't thought to look at it. Flipping through each of the files you found pages and pages dedicated to each of the members. Origins, abilities, ages, family, medical history, it was all there on simple paper. It felt like knowledge you weren't supposed to have. 

Natasha’s file stood out. She had a very long list of confirmed kills and other sinister accomplishments, but right after it there was a list of all her good deeds. The later outweighed the former. The experiments that the KGB had performed on her where also listed. Most had wording you didn’t understand completely, not that it mattered, you could almost feel the pain they must have caused her. At the end of her file a simple note had been added and then scratched out, “death confirmed on Vormir.” It was followed by a time stamp only a few days before Thanos had landed on Earth. Another note was added in following the previous, “recovered from Vormir following destruction of Soul Stone.” Its time stamp was a few days following the reverse of the Snap. Mind racing you felt like ice was sliding down your spine. She had died? A confirmed death would mean she died. On whatever the hell Vormir was. The but second note made it seem like maybe she hadn’t.

Her melancholy aura and sad, distant eyes made a lot of sense. You had worked with people who had believed that they’re last purpose in life was to die. That the greater good of the people around them was dependent on them no longer being there. Your heart broke. For her. For everyone in the file. You continued reading until the tears had come and gone and you were left crying with dry eyes. Empathic abilities led to heightened emotions, not just yours but people around you. It also led you to feeling for others as deeply as if they were your own emotions. Your presence turned into an emotional conduit. 

For years you feared what would happen if you lost control. Fear could stop a person in their tracks, while happiness could also give someone a heart attack. Too much of anything was dangerous. And you had learned that the hard way. But reading the files was pulling emotions out of you, practically making the world around you feel like it was trembling- 

“Y/N? Are you okay?” a knock at the door, followed by a soothing voice pulled you out of the downward spiral you had been lost too. 

“Um, yea-yeah sorry,” your reply came out tilted, wrong. 

“Can I come in?” 

“Yes, of course!” you push your hands to your eyes trying to scrub away the signs of you crying. 

Soft footsteps followed the gentle woosh of your door being opened, bringing Natasha into your room. It was the first time since you had showed up that you had seen anyone outside of training. Her eyes scanned the room, ending on you and falling to the file in your lap. The corners of her mouth twitched downwards before they fell open to let out a sigh. She walked over to you desk chair and pulled it next to the bed. 

“So you finally looked huh?”

“I was trying to get a better grasp on the scope of what is going on here. I’ve felt like I'm drowning,” you pause, “But I shouldn’t have read it. This is… personal. I can tell. I’m sorry.” You weren’t quite sure if you were apologizing for seeing the file or for what was in it.

Her eyebrows moved in a fluid motion as they came together in a questioning way, “Why are you apologizing? We made sure you had them. Its important that you are aware fo what is going on here. Besides, those are my past mistakes.”

It was you turn to give her a questioning look, “I’m sorry for the pain.” Reaching out you laid a hand on the one she had resting in her knee. At the mention of it, you felt a small flicker of pain leave Natasha. Like she had been holding a door shut, but some had managed to still leak out. You tried to let the pain leave her, maybe be replaced by something more pleasant. 

“It’s not yours to be sorry for,” she tried to comfort you, laying her other hand on top of yours, “But thank you. I try not to think about it.”

“Paper cuts still hurt even if you don’t pay attention to it,” comes your response before you can make yourself shut up. Your surprised to hear a laugh fall out of Natasha’s mouth. It causes you to pull your hand back from her.

“I hadn’t really thought of that.”

Now you were embarrassed, of course the Black Widow didn’t consider paper cuts painful. Again you’re reminded of how much of an outsider you are. Not really belonging. Like the ugly duckling, just a gosling, to confused to realize its not even a duck. You bit your lip and let you eye fall to the file in your. Noticing now you had crumpled some of the papers from gripping them to hard. 

“I came here because I was in the kitchen and I felt the rumbling,” Natasha said clearing her throat a little to catch your attention. Slowly you raised your eyes to her face. She had a look like she was trying to figure you out. 

“I dont know what was causing it,” you reply lamely.

“It was you, at least I think.” 

That caused you eyebrows to rocket up your face, “What? No! No? I, uh I cant do anything like that. Just feelings. Remember?” 

She has an amused look on her face, “I have met may very gifted people in my life. Who could do things they never imagined. Maybe try to do it again.”

Anxiety welled up in your chest, “I don't think thats a good idea. I-i don't have great control over it. Emotions are too unpredictable.”

“Then practice like your practicing everything else.”

“Right, just like I'm failing at everything else,” you grumble out at her. She laughs again. 

“You’re not failing. Actually, you are getting a lot better. And obviously you're putting the the extra effort to get better,” she nodded at the file in your lap. “Be gentle with yourself.”

You too, you whisper in your head. Sighing, you look towards the clock on your nightstand. It was almost 9 PM but you hadn’t eaten. Almost on cue your stomach rumbled, protesting the lack of food. 

Natasha had been looking down the hallway out of your door, “Someone dropped off a casserole for us to eat. There’s never food here, so I was about to go warm it up. Would you want to some?” Your lips pull into a smile and you nod. Getting up the two of you walk to the kitchen. The rest of the night is spent talking, Natasha even found a bottle of wine to open and share. You both loosened up, and you felt like you were connecting with Natasha. She wasn’t just the practiced smiles you had received until that night.

Maybe amounting to the Avengers was going to be so much harder than you thought, but being a friend for someone who obviously needed it was a lot easier. 

——————————-

The tipping point was during sparring about a month later. Natasha had offered extra training time with just her which had helped you start making forward progress. You two spent most of your free time together, either training or trying to come up with food to make in the kitchen. She was actually a friend at this point, not like either of you had many options. But you had noticed her emotions fluctuating more. She smiled genuinely at jokes you made, slowly the blanket of sadness she had wrapped herself in started to fall way. The sadness never went away completely, but it wasn’t all she was feeling either.

The extra training made a difference. One that you knew even Steve had noticed, maybe only because he had stopped badgering you during training sessions. Instead it seemed like he had elected to just plain ignoring you. Which honestly, you were fine with.

But today was different. You were partnered with another woman about your size, but much more agile. She dodged your strikes with ease, while returning painful jabs back to you that you couldn’t move away from. Holding form and still moving through the stances, combined with fists flying at you was making the routine difficult. You hadn’t slept well the night before and were just off a little. 

“If you moved slower then maybe you’d get hit less than you are right now,” came a very snide comment from across the room. 

You had made an effort to keep smart remarks locked into just your head when he spoke at the beginning of training sessions. But for some reason today had been the day that he decided to pick you out of the crowd. The one muscle that had had less work to do, was your jaw. You had successfully not let any comments slip past you lips, but he was asking for it. You might not be fast with you fists but your tongue was. 

Grinding you molars into each other, you attempted to block out his voice. Even if it was done by breaking all the teeth in your head. 

“Your stance is slipping. Keep it tighter.” You ground down a little harder. 

“Your arms are weak and moving to slow. Block the hits before they get to you.” Even harder. 

“What are your feet doing? That’s not a stance.” Harder. 

Suddenly, he was behind you and reaching out to grab your arm in the middle of a strike. Your concentration had been in landing the movement correctly and his antagonizing voice had only been adding to the boiling rage in your chest. So you landed the strike, with all your pent up anger falling in behind it. It was the best you’d ever done, Steve would have been impressed.

If only you hadn’t landed it on him. 

The hit was more than just a normal strike. The anger behind it added to it’s force and propelled the very large man backwards and off his feet. A sick thud vibrated through the room when he hit the mats behind you. All movement in the gym stopped. All eyes were on you. No one was breathing.

You were pretty sure you had never felt your eyes be wider than they had been in the exact moment. Tingles ran up and down your arm to you finger tips. Power surging under you skin waiting to be let out again. But cold dread was also snaking its way down your back. You’d hurt someone. Lost control and taken it out on another person. You had promised yourself it wouldn’t happen again. 

Steve had righted himself shaking his head to clear it, his face unreadable. The shock coming off him was clear. He moved to take a step towards you and a flip switched. Not sure where you were headed, your feet bolted. 

Out the gym doors. Down the twisting hallways. Left. Right, Right. So many turns. Until you found yourself in front of the large, steel, double doors. Pushing through them, you kept running. Down the road. Out. Gone.


	4. Chapter 4

The footsteps heading towards you were too heavy to be Natasha’s, but that didn’t stop you from being surprised when he sat down next to you under the large tree. 

You had run just short of one of the gates leading to the compound. Leaving felt like abandoning the hard work you had put in, but staying felt like losing something of yourself. If you stayed you were making a choice to keep pushing that anger and energy in you. It was something you had tried to keep down. To not lose control. 

Steve broke your line of thought, “You know its about six miles from here to the compound.”

You could feel the humor falling off of him. He was obviously enjoying this little moment. Trying to be discrete, you let your eyes slide over to his face. His hair was longer than you had ever seen in pictures of him in the news. The beard on his face was also getting long but the lack of knots and its combed appearance led you to believe he tried to take care of it. He had dark circles under his eyes, from a old kind of tired that sat heavy in his bones. None of that took away from the fact that he was very plainly handsome. You remember a friend saying he was boy-next-door hot when he had first come out of the ice. That softer version of him wasn’t anywhere in the man sitting next to you, it was hard to even think of them as the same person. 

His normal cold exterior fell into place almost immediately. Like a favorite coat he always put on. Tension radiated from him, making you feel antsy. Your fingers twitched in a want to reach out and try to make his shoulders relax. You could offer him the same relief you had off and on given to Natasha. Just a moment of reprieve from the ghosts in her head. You didn’t though, you eyes landed on the gate, on a choice. He wanted to be cold then he could.

“Nat said you read our files. That it had caused you to make the walls shake.”

The bubble of the peaceful moment burst, letting anger take a place in you chest. You steeled your gaze and looked at him, “So you thought pushing me to do it again was a good idea? What the fuck is wrong with you. I could have seriously hurt someone!” Anger grew into a monster in your chest, but you made sure to keep you arms wrapped around your chest. Contain the danger. Hold the monster in. “You’re lucky I didn’t hit the girl, she’s not super human. It could have seriously hurt her.”

He returned his own icy glare to you, meeting your own eyes in a challenge, “You think I don’t know what I'm doing? Notice how I stepped in? Its my job to push you.” Frustration was making the air around you thick. You couldn’t be sure if it was yours or his.

“I liked it better when you ignored me. Let me be,” you hiss. Pulling away from the eye contact.

“I haven’t been ignoring you.”

“At least you didn’t talk to me,” you snort in response.

He closed his eyes and sighed like you had told him you ran over his dog, “You have great potential-‘

“-and with it come great responsibility,” the snarky remark slipped out of your mouth, interrupting him.

That obviously hit a nerve, causing him to shoot up to his feet. He stood over you like a pissed off foster parent after you broke something, “You cant take anything seriously. You could actually do some good here. Some good with your life. And you waste it by joking and running away from it!” The end came out as more of a growl.

You couldn’t be quite sure what caused you to be so obstinate, but something about him made you want to push his buttons. Break down the cool exterior that he always carried, “Thats rich coming from the guy who tried to go back to a life in the past and gave up the shield!” You recalled the line of notes from his file. Sam Wilson and Bruce Banner had stopped him from returning to a past life he had missed. There were also notes from a psychologist on attempting to help him adjust to modern life, without much progress. “Your hiding too! So don’t lecture me!” you spit at him. Standing toe to toe with him you push a finger into his broad chest. Driving the point home.

His face shifted through about a thousand different emotions, each crashing into you like waves. It caused you to try to retreat from it, pushing them away from you and back at him. Too quickly you felt trapped in the eye of a storm of you own creation. Steve’s mouth was moving saying something that your ears where missing. His eyes were cold, mean. Maybe you couldn’t hear him, but you could tell whatever he was saying would hurt. 

“ENOUGH!” 

The two of you take a step back form each other, turning to look at a very angry Natasha. Her outburst was uncharacteristic of her. It chilled your insides, pulling out all the anger and bravado you had built up in yourself a moment before. Steve also looked like he was deflating. The hard shield he carried around himself sliding into place. How ironic he had used a shield for so many years. 

“Natas-“ “Nat-“ you both start at the same time only to be cut off by her raised hand. Her other went to her face, pinching the bridge of her nose. 

“Steve, Sam is back with the group from Russia. Go debrief. And take a fucking nap,” she held his stare until he moved back in the direction of the compound. You turned your back on him, a small part of you still feeling angry about the entire thing. 

“You need to get sleep too.”

“Take me off of group training,” you ask softly. It was mean to come out firm but you lost your nerve.

“You need to train and I will make sure-“

“Take me off. I will train with you or whatever. I wont train with people who could get hurt,” this time the words feel strong.

Another sigh falls out of Natasha, “Alright, fitness training only. You're also going to start working on you abilities.”

“What if I don't want too?” You whip around to face her, challenging her directly.

“You need control. You weren’t even fighting the other night and it happened. Learn to control it,” her tone left nothing up for discussion.

Again you found yourself staring at the gate. Trying to block out the past few hours.

“You cant run from it. I’ve tried too and so have you. You don't have to run here. We’re here for you,” is all she says before she walks away, leaving you standing in front of a choice. 

—————————

When you returned to your room, you found an email on the tablet. It was a very formal disinvited from the training group to let you know it was removed from your daily schedule. Expecting to see Natasha’s name as the sender, a rouge wave of hurt flashed in your chest when you saw Steve’s instead. He hadn’t even waited for you to back out, he’d kicked you out. 

Several hours passed of you trying to find solace in your concrete container, but it really was to no avail. At almost midnight you gave up and headed towards the kitchen. Your half-asleep brain missed the noises and light spilling into the hallway until you stood at the door for the kitchen. More was happening in there then you have ever seen. 

A man stood in the center making do knows what, while dancing to music that only he could hear. You had frozen in your tracks when you noticed him, watching to see what was going on. His movements eventually ended with him turning to you and dropping the bowl in his hand on the counter, “OH holy fuck!”

“Hi to you too,” you grumbled at him, making your way towards the cabinet with cereal in it. You hopped up on the shelf to grab a bowl, that were always just out of reach.

“Good fucking god woman! Give a man a heads up next time! Fucking blair witching in the doorway!”

You couldn’t help but snort at him. He had to be the most lively person you had seen in a long while. You noticed that he was dressed in a tactical suit, with a large portion of the back looking like it attached to backpack or something. You stuck out you hand to him, “Heads up!”

He returned the gesture, “Sam. Sam Wilson.”

“James. James Bond,” you fill in, in place of your own name. “Actually is Y/N, but it’d be much cooler if I was James Bond.”

He had an easy smile that naturally fit his face, “Aaaaah, the new one! I’ve read a few reports about you. You’re big news, its been a while since we’ve had fresh meat around here.” He lightly elbowed you and went to sit at one of the stools. 

“Well, trust me, whatever you’ve read. Its ten times worse,” throwing him a smile you finished pouring cereal into a bowl. You had meant to grab a bowl and go back to you room, but now you weren’t sure. 

Sam seemed to have picked up on your hesitation, “You’re welcome to stay, I promise I wont bite.”

“Maybe I do,” you throw back.

“Eh. I think can handle it. Besides you look to tired to put up much fight.”

A sigh escaped you, “Yeah, well things never stop here. Im sure you know that.” An easy conversation started between the two of you. Each of you took turns talking about how you ended up there, what life had been like on the outside, and whatever else. Sam seemed to be a very normal person. Very happy go lucky and content with the world. But under all of it, there was a current of the same sadness Natasha and Steve harbored. It wasn’t as strong. Or maybe he was just better at taking it. 

At some point the two of you had both started to call it a night, moving to clean up your bowls and head your separate ways. With you back turned to the door as you filled a dishwasher, Sam called out, “Hey man! What’s up?” Your body went cold, locking you in place. A deeper, groggier voice answered, “Lookin’ for something to eat. Hope you didn’t eat all the cheerios.” You have never heard Steve speak in such a relaxed tone. He sounded like a normal guy just going about his day. Until that moment, you had only really known drill-sergeant Steve.

Pulling away from the dishwasher you try to keep you head down and to get out of his way before you two go at it again-

“So, are you and Y/A best buds yet or what? She’s hilarious! I can’t believe you didn’t tell me about that!”

Fucking hell Sam. 

You turn and lock eyes with a very different Steve. During training everyone wore tactical suits, like Sams, and you had only ever seen him in one. Which at the moment seemed like a damned shame. His sleep shirt fit much more closely to his body, you could see the muscles in his chests and arms, along with a very narrow but sturdy waist. This fact also meant that he was getting an eyeful of your sleep clothes. Very short, thin sleep bottoms and a worn out tank top did little to hide your body. Sam hadn’t payed much attention to you to cause you to feel self conscious about how you were dressed. But the way Steve’s eyes almost burned you as they took you in, to then land squarely on your face, you felt like you where getting yelled at without him even opening his mouth. Blood rushed up your neck as embarrassment flooded around you. 

“I-um, I need to go. To bed. I need to go to bed. It was very nice to meet you Sam,” you stumble out as you push past Steve, careful to not touch him. Once you cleared the doorway, your feet move you into a dead sprint until you all the way into you room. No mount of cold water to your face would make the red blush on you neck and chest disappear. How fucking stupid? Of course he had to show up. To ruin a good night you had had with Sam. 

Sleep was difficult to reach all night, bright blue eyes seemed to follow you though your dreams.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally, some real interaction!

Waking up in the morning, you rejoiced in knowing that you wouldn’t have to encounter Captain Cranky Pants. An email from Natasha gave you a new time for training led by her, following your usual intel training. 

Walking into the board room that operated as your groups classroom, you’re surprised to see Sam seated at the end of the long table where Natasha normally sits, “Sam? Hi.”

“Hey! Guess its bring your favorite Avenger to work day huh?”

You laugh with him, but are cut off as more people enter the room. You catch a few glances trying to figure out where the two of you know each other from. Turning, you make your way to the other end of the room, sitting in your usual seat in the back. Natasha finally walks in, signaling the beginning of the meeting. 

“Can anyone give me the information on who’s with us today?” She asks in a plain tone, while looking down at a stack of papers.

“Sam Wilson, alias is Falcon. Three years ago was given Captain America’s shield and positioned as head field agent. He leads most operations taking place outside of the compound,” the words fell out of you mouth before you realized you had even finished talking. Sam cocked an eyebrow at you, obviously impressed. Natasha also looked up form her paperwork, a small smile tugging at the corner of her mouth. 

“And what was the last operation he was on?”

“Intelligence collection in Russia, tracking a nuclear arms dealer. The information gained is going to be used to support an upcoming mission to get a successful arrest on the dealer,” confidence growing you answer again before someone else has the chance.

“Dealer name?” Comes a follow up question from Sam this time.

“Milos Pushkin. His family has ties with the KGB,” you finish. 

Natasha’s satisfaction with your answers is very clear and Sam seems very impressed with how you answered too. She looks down at the files in front of her and begins sliding them out to each of you sitting around the table. When you opened the file, you realize all the information you had provided was on the pages in front of you. It was the debriefing report Natasha had sent Steve to the night before. You had seen it show up in the database last night after your close encounter in the kitchen and had read it in hopes of boring your very energized brain to sleep. But here you were providing the information like you were expected to be able to. Even when you had been behind, the others in the room hadn’t been perfect at either. This was training, everyone here had things to learn. You had just managed to report the needed info perfectly. Not missing any details. And that was before you had even seen the file. 

The rest of the session carried on as normal. As a group, you all broke down the mission, went through how you would do it, taking criticism from Natasha and Sam as you went. Your earlier success bolstered your confidence, and you found yourself answering more questions. Filling in the gaps that other people missed. And asking you down questions in return for better understanding. At the end, it was the first time you were walking out a training session feeling confident about what had happened. 

Sam came up next you, placing his hand on your shoulder, “Good job kiddo, thanks for elaborating on my status.” He gave you a wink and walked off to do what he needed with the rest of his day. 

A small cough in the conference room grabbed your attention, you turned to Natasha still looking down at the files making notes in them. 

“You did really good today,” she offered, “So I will be expecting that kind of performance from now on.” Her eyes filled with a mischievous light. “Alright, are you ready for training?”

You groaned in response, “Yeah, but fuck.” Drawing out the u to elongate the word. The two of you walked down a couple of hallways, ending up at a door you had not gone through before. As the door opened, it appeared to just be another training gym, just smaller than the one you were used to. The ceiling were taller, with large ropes hanging from them. Targets also lined the far wall. Part of you didn’t want to think about if you’d have to start doing target practice. 

You both got ready. Seeing as it was just Natasha, you went without the tactical outfit, instead you wore plain black leggings and a fitted shirt. Since arriving at the compound, your clothes had started to fit you differently, areas were slimmer while other had filled out in satisfying ways. You noticed your build was beginning to match Natasha’s very trim physique. 

The two of you moved through various sparring techniques. She offered you more feedback, both negative and positive. Her training was no easier than Steve’s, but you felt like you were getting more from it.

The next month or so followed a similar pattern. Intel sessions had shifted completely, you had found your rhythm in it. With Natasha in private training, you also continued to move forward with your strength and confidence in combat. Natasha enjoyed letting you gain your footing with a new set of moves. Only to through one at you mind fight and end with your head spinning and you back flat on the mats. Only from time to time did you ever let the emotional side of your fighting out. You tired to make sure it was always contained, nothing that could cause any real damage. Outside of training you and Natasha spent more time together. You helped with filling reports and pretty basic duties. Sam would also join you guys form time to time. At your pleading, he also promised to make a lasagna dish he had been boasting about. About once a week the three of you ended up in the closed off kitchen, making dinner and laugh with drinking a bottle of wine. Steve never joined in, not that you’d know if the other two lent an invitation to him. You had pretty much not seen him since the night in the kitchen. He seemed more like an elusive poltergeist that showed at random times to freak you out. 

As per usual, when things go good for a while, life liked to throw a curve ball straight at your head. You had walked into the private gym, expecting to find just Natasha, but happily surprised to see Sam there as well. Both were seated on mats in the middle fo the floor stretching. You call out a great as you join them.

“Hey Y/N! Mind if I crash your lessons?” Asked Sam in his usual chipper tone. 

“I mean only if you can handle getting your ass handed to you by a girl. Not to brag but I’m getting pretty good,” you shoot back at him. Catching Natasha’s up-ticked eyebrow, you quickly add, “Better. I am getting better. Please do not hurt me Nat.” 

All three of you laugh and keep taking shots at each other while stretching. Part of you actually is looking forward to this session. Sam was always nice, and from the intel meetings you had with him it was clear he was also very skilled. Learning from him in a new way would be interesting.

That was until an icy, brooding presence walked into the room. You felt him long before you saw him. His very closed off and guarded attitude leaking into mind. At the end of it though you felt something that seemed like apprehension. You felt your eyes bug out of your face. Sam and Natasha looked at you, and then shared a glance that you didn’t quite pick up on. They both shared a level of anticipation for what was going to come up next. You raised an eyebrow at them, Natasha had been the only one to see you and Steve fight. Sam had only really seen the very awkward, close encounter in the kitchen a while back. Neither of them should really be nervous about you and Steve in the same room. Unless he had let on about his distain for you to them. The last conversation the two of you had ended with you being split apart like kids and put I time out. Oh, and Steve kicking you out of training via an email. You knew that you might have pushed his buttons, but he had done the same. 

Natasha popped up off the ground, clapping her hands together, “Alright, so as you mentioned Y/N, you are getting a lot better. So, Sam and I thought it was time for you to start training against someone larger than you. And then well also start with a group attack. It will give you more experience for what a real fight might hand you.” There was a spark of mischief in her eye that only dumped another wave of cold dread down your spine. Sam stood up and offered his hand out to Steve with a “Hey man”, who was still standing behind you. Slowly you stood up. Locking eyes with Natasha and trying to put as much malice into the look as you could. 

Turning you were surprised with how close Steve had been to you. You could have reached an arm out and touched him if you wanted. Trying to act much braver than you felt, you looked him in the eye and offered your own hand to him. He looked down at it, thinking for a moment before taking it in his much larger one. This was the first time you had actually made contact with his skin, and it lead to you catching more of the feeling he had locked away so tight. You could almost feel them fighting inside him, but none of them every lasted long enough for you to get a full impression of what he felt. It was all fleeting and confusing. Part of you wondered how feeling like that, was after a long time. It seemed exhausting. Another part of you became aware that you were holding his hand much longer than you needed to for a typical handshake. He was still looking down at you. The bruising under his eyes hadn’t changed much, but the ice in them had. He didn’t have the same coldness burning in them like the last time you saw him. 

You also noticed he was not in a tactual suit again. The tight fitness shirt was doing little to act as a shirt, nothing really seemed hidden from view. He was in joggers that were sitting low on his hips and caused you to feel embarrassed for noticing. You dropped his hand after having held it for too long and took a step back from him, tucking both arms behind your back. Turning to Natasha you waited for her to start telling you were to go. A small part of you felt like you could feel him looking at you more than watching Natasha while she began explaining the session. Part of you wished you had your tactical suit. You felt exposed in the tight leggings and cropped compression top.

Natasha grabbed both of your attention by having everyone moved through various practice motions. Sam would interject at times to give you corrections to you form or stance. But Steve remained silent. A very silent brooding figure just out of your peripheral view. It felt like the whole thing was building to a climax that you were not ready for. 

Thats when Natasha hit you with it, “Okay Sam and I will show the moves, you’ll pull them off on Steve.” You could have sworn you felt your eye twitch. Her wording wasn’t helping either. You felt another wave of turmoil roll off Steve. As if sensing your inner protest, She answered “He is the size of the average guy you’ll end up coming across in a mission.” A very soft but indignant “hey” came out of Sam. Her attention then locked on the Steve, “And you need practice getting out of these holds and trying to prevent them. Even if you never leave the compound.” The end of the sentence seemed to be a jab and you could tell Steve felt so by the hint of anger and irritation that escaped him.

“What are the moves?” You ground out at her feeling your own irritation mix with Steve’s. Again a small, but very wicked smile crosses her face. 

“Excellent question,” she paused looking at Sam, “Would you be a dear and attack me?”

They separated and both settled into stances, typical sparring forms, and then Sam rushed her. Instead of using any strikes to deflect is on coming attack, she matched his momentum and used against him to launch herself far enough into the air to end up with her legs around his throat. You had watched hours or footage of Natasha pulling this very move on people, it was her signature. But your brain was also computing the fact that you were going to get that up close and personal to Steve.

The two continued with showing you other incapacitating moves. Ones that you would use against someone much larger and stronger than you. Natasha kept repeating that you had to have these perfect, they could be the difference between you living or dying on a mission. That wasn’t what was making your throat close up though. The very imposing man behind you was. Neither of you had had an interaction that was pleasant. And now he was about to be stuck with you legs around his throat until Natasha was satisfied. They repeated the movements a couple of times, breaking down the steps. You put all your attention into absorbing what they told you , so that you could do this as few times as possible. 

Once they felt that you got it, still not sure if that was true, you were squared up with Steve on the mat. He started to move his feet in an attempt to circle you, which you match by moving in the same direction. Neither one of you seemed to want to make the first move at each other, which was ironic. This was the moment to take some anger out. But you both just kept circling. Thats when you heard Sam call out, “Come on Cap’ she’s just a little girl. What are you so scare of?” Another flurry of confusing emotions rolled off Steve, making you scrunch you eyebrows in confusion. He seemed to have caught the movement, promptly shutting down whatever it was that he was feeling. 

Natasha also seemed to be tired of watching you two not really do anything, “Enough dancing, make a move!” She put emphasis on the last word and you cut your eyes from Steve’s face to hers. That was a mistake. You had opened yourself up. Steve’s large form was then surging forwards at you. You stoped breathing for a second. The movements flashed in your head. Planting you feet you let out one breath. Pulled another in. And braced for his strike. He reached out like he was supposed to. You grabbed the middle of his arm around the elbow. Using that as an anchor you swung the rest of your body upwards. As gravity started to grab at you, you looped a leg around his neck at the last moment. And locked it with you other. Arching you back, you threw your weight against his momentum. And you knock him off balance. You did it. 

You felt like cheering, holy shit you did it! The next holy shit was for the fact that now you and Steve were both falling to the mat. Panic rushed over you and down through your hands. You felt the energy from when you had hit him leave you and push Steve as far from you as it could. It didn’t help with the falling aspect. You hit the mat hard, skull bouncing off it a few times, as you slid across the room. Steve seemed to have received the same treatment. He hit the mat with a much louder thud followed by a groan. Things sounded fury for a second, before it all caught up. Steve was starting to sit up and look at you like you were insane. 

“Oh my god! Steve - I am so sorry! I didn’t mean to! I panicked!” You pushed out trying to stand and get to the other three. You expected the typical anger or resentment that sometimes came off of him. Instead, he seemed to be surprised by your apology. It barely trickled through the iron clad wall he had build up in him, but you could feel it. It did weird things to your stomach. He looked you up and down, having decided you were okay and pushed himself off the floor. 

“I wouldn’t have landed on you,” was all he responded with. Sam and Natasha watched to the side. You just nodded your head, feeling guilt wash over you. 

“That’s a pretty neat trick you got there,” Sam interjected, “Can you do that on purpose?”

You felt the embarrassment start to creep up your back and throat, “No.” Thats all you responded.

“Gotta figure that one out, that would really come in handy.”

Steve was still looking at you, a very guarded interest hiding behind the vibrant blue irises. He nodded his head back to the mat, “We’ll keep going until you don't panic.”

————————

Since the first day of training, both Sam and Steve joined you and Natasha in the gym. They didn’t often work with the two of you, instead opting for their own routines or sparring practice. But they would step in for a day when Natasha felt maniacal, and wanted to watch you squirm around Steve. 

Outside of training, Natasha and Sam started given you more duties in the compound. Mostly paper work that gave you a headache after a while. But it was nice to start really feeling part of the large picture. There still had been no discussion about you actually going on missions, but you didn’t worry about it. Being in the compound felt like where you should be at the time. More and more often, you, Natasha, and Sam found yourselves congregating in the kitchen at the end of the day. It seemed natural to come together to eat dinner, even if it was only cereal or apple slices. 

At one point you finally asked, “Why is there never things in here to cook?” The other two shared a look, with it sadness seeped into your bones. You hadn’t meant to strike a nerve, it just seemed odd.

“Before the Accords, we used to pretty much all live together like a frat on steroids,” Same offered, “Someone always cooked, everyone who was there ate, and we all cleaned up.”

“I think after everything that happened we just got used to being alone,” Natasha added. Her gaze seemed like she was somewhere else. Somewhere happier. “Most of the people who used to be here don't even live in the country. We all kinda ended up scattered.” 

Out of all the names in the file on your desk, only three still were here. They were trying to live with ghosts around them. No wonder no one cooked. No wonder no one had really seemed to hang out. They had had that. A family of some kind, but now that seemed to be splintered. 

“Would you guys mind if I made Friday’s mandatory meal days?” You asked, hoping to maybe bring the mile back to their faces. Until right then you hadn’t realized how different things were from when you first walked into the compound. They both looked up at you, small smiles appearing in the corners fo their mouths. The sadness was still in the air, but so was a little bit of hope.

————————-

You had requested that everything for a tortilla soup be in the kitchen the following Friday. Your day had ended early, and with nothing else to do you figured you start on dinner. Veggies were cut and arranged on a pan with the chicken to cook for a while. Beans had been drained and set aside to be ready to throw in the large pot sitting on the stove top. Humming to yourself you moved around the kitchen with a practiced ease. It felt nice to being able to do something to make the place place feel more like a home. In your focus, you missed Steve walk into the kitchen. He paused in the doorway, watching you. He never really got to see you in a relaxed state, you always seemed so tense when he walked in the room. It had really irritated him. Your first encounter was your own fault. Showing up late and then mouthing off wasn’t the way to walk into a new situation. But over a short amount of time, it felt like you both looked for ways to rub the other the wrong way. He’d give you extra laps and you curse at him under you breathe. Or out loud if you were really feeling gutsy. Yet here you were, a soft tune was floating out of you. The moment gave him a look at another side of your sharp tongue. A softer side he had seen you let out for Natasha. Or the humorous part of you that flowed easy with Sam. Someone very different from the very angry girl who liked to push his buttons. Watching you, pulled a memory into life, one of his mother swaying and singing to herself in the kitchen while making dinner. It caused a pang to ring in his chest, which must have found its way to you you. 

You whipped around to find Steve standing in the doorway. He’d let his guard down, the cold shield he always has up, slipped. For a second you saw a look in his face that seems like a memory. But just as quick its gone. His practice facade back in place. Shifting uncomfortably you try to go back to focusing on shredding the hot chicken in front of you. You try to not think to hard about how you heart stutters in you chest or that instead of leaving when he saw you, Steve moved further into the kitchen. Opening up the fridge he examined the empty appliance. Followed shortly by closing it in frustration. You tried to summon some courage to speak to him like he was just a normal person. 

“I’m making tortilla soup. And quesadillas. For dinner.” The sentence was choppy and very awkward, but you got it out.

“It smells good,” is all he offered back to you.

You huffed and set down the two forks you had been shredding the chicken with, giving Steve your full attention, “I’m making it for me and Sam and Nat… and you too if you would like to join us for dinner.” 

He seemed surprised, either by your forwardness or offer, “I-I might. Its been a while since I had cooked food.”

Quickly you try to turn away from him, so he wont notice how fast your face and shifted into a grin. Into the chicken you say, “Great! Everyone will be here at 7. Nat has a meeting until then. If you want to come I need to know now though, so I make enough for the super solider.” As the last bit left your mouth you cringe. Physically, like your body was trying to get away from the words you just uttered.

Steve noticed your cringe, watching as your face scrunched up. It was funny that you had surprised even yourself with the teasing remark, let alone him, “Um, yes count the super solider in.”

In your attempt to hide your emotions, you missed the shy smile that crossed his face. He could see the way you cheeks tugged upwards and could hear in your voice that you were happy as you told him you’d have it all ready. It was probably the first time the two of you had had a nice conversation. It was small. But it was nice. He left you alone, giving you space to relax. To go back to the happy woman humming to herself in the kitchen.

———————

After you had thrown everything in the pot to let it simmer until you all were going to eat, you went to your room to shower. It seemed weird to have planned time to spend with everyone. Everyone. Including Steve, who for the first time seemed somewhat the gentle giant you had read that he used to be. He was faint though. God. A shower was much needed. Maybe a cold one to get your hands to stop shaking. Since you had been at the compound, you had started to feel like your abilities were waking up in a way. They had become very sensitive to everyone around you. And the whole energy expelling thing was also new. It made you feel a little out of control. Like you couldn’t get a grasp on yourself. You had mentioned it to Natasha, who had frowned and said she’d look into someone who might be able to help you. 

the shower helped a little. Let you feel like you were scrubbing off the old and moving forward. You didn’t know how the others where going to be dressed for dinner, but it wasn’t anything fancy. A small, whiny part of your brain argued for pj’s, but that brought a burning redness to your face remembering the last time Steve saw you in them. Jeans and an overlarge sweater would work. At first you couldn’t decide to leave it untucked, or tucked. Did you leave your hair down, or pull it up. Roll the cuffs of the jeans or not. After fidgeting with your clothes, you sighed giving up. There was no reason to feel so antsy. 

The kitchen was filled with a very delicious aroma when you walked into it. The soup was about done and you went about getting quesadillas made and on plates. You went about working, not hesitating to sneak shredded cheese into your mouth— 

“Won’t that ruin your dinner?”

You about spewed the cheese everywhere, as you rounded on the voice that caught you in the act. A very amused looking Steve, again, was standing in the kitchen doorway watching you make a fool of yourself. You caught an actual smile on his face, and not one he was rushing to hide.

“You don't need to be here for another fifteen minutes,” you blurted out.

“I came early to offer help. My mother raised me right,” he responded indignantly, like you had insulted him. A small amount of tension rolled off him. 

“Yeah, yeah, okaaay. But if you had been on time then you wouldn’t have caught me sneaking cheese,” you retorted in an attempt to get you heart beating normally again and to let Steve know you weren’t attacking him.

“But I would have missed the look on you face after it,” his tone was softer, and the smile crept back across his face. You ducked your head down, trying to force back the random blush creeping up your neck. He offered to take over making the quesadillas so you could get plates set out. With the soup being basically done and only a few minutes before Natasha and Sam showed up, you moved to grab bowls from a top cabinet. You stood staring at the shelf with the bowls. Always just out of reach. If you had been alone, or even with Sam or Natasha, then you would have just climbed up to grab them. But that didn’t really seem appropriate in that exact moment. You stretched feebly trying to get to them.

While you considered climbing or grabbing a stool to reach the bowls, Steve had noticed you stop and look at the shelf, it was clear you wouldn’t be able to reach them. He flipped the quesadilla he was cooking off the pan and walked to your side to help. Mid-decision to grab a stool you felt Steve shift to stand behind you. For such a large man he moved so quietly. The only thing letting you know he was there the warmth coming off of him, very close to you back. If you leaned back only a little bit then you’d be touching him. But it didn’t seem to phase him. He placed his left arm on the counter next to you and with his right, easily procured the elusive bowls. 

You felt you heart thud hard against your chest. It was so loud that he must have been able to here it. The traitor. It was going to give away a secret you hadn’t even admitted to yourself. But here it was ready to sing out to the world just how you felt. He had placed the bowls in front of you and gently closed the door to the cabinet. Not quite sure why, but he ran his hand across the top of you back. You sucked in a quick breathe in surprise. He’d touched you. So calmly. Like it was nothing. Just reached out and touched you. Your head was about fly away from the rest of you and your heart was going to chase after it.

Touching you hadn’t really been a conscious decision. It felt to Steve like it had just happened. It felt like the right move to make in the moment. It had let him feel you stiffen under his touch, but also catch a wave of your own emotion from you. He couldn’t quite tell what it was, but it was intense. Somewhere along the lines of what he felt when he was around you. Confusion, anger, something else. It wasn’t all directed at him, just what you were feeling. He hadn’t noticed that effect of you power, you sharing your own feelings, until just then. But he had caught on to when you felt others. Its like you were listening to the radio on a bad channel, and all of the sudden you found the right frequency and could hear it perfectly. It made your eyes brighten, until you reacted to what you felt at least. 

He pulled away from you, without any indication about what just happened, and returned to his duty as quesadilla maker. You try to suck air in and out of your lungs, while staring at the bowls in front of you. Seeking a glance, it didn’t look like he found the interaction to be strange. In fact he didn’t seem to be reacting at all. In hopes of getting your head in order, you focused on soup. On getting soup from the pot into the bowls. Its the most fascinating thing you have ever done. Putting soup into bowls. 

When Sam and Natasha both walk in the kitchen, finding you and Steve in the same small space without each others hands on the others neck was a little shocking. The two of you were working in tandem to make plates and bowls. Neither one of you really were speaking, you both had just found a simple harmony in making dinner. As they settled in at the breakfast bar, you caught Natasha’s eyes watching you very carefully. The analytical spy slipping into her dark eyes, all to figure out what was going on between you and the super soldier. In hopes of not having a nervous break down, you slowly shook your head at her and went on with placing bowls in front of her and Sam. Sam, much less the spy, had struck up a simple conversation with Steve. If he found it odd that they two of you were together making dinner, he didn’t let on at all. Instead he opted to act like nothing was abnormal. 

The rest of the night went smooth, you had sat next to Natasha on one end. Steve found his way down by Sam, on the opposite end. Everyone ate, and drank the scotch that Natasha had brought with her. Hours past and you felt like you could see glimpses of what the mighty Avengers had once been. There were times when a story would lull, like they were waiting for someone else to fill in the whole. Or a remark they had expected to hear wouldn’t come. Each time it happened the three of them shot each other a look and you felt a collective sadness permeate the air. But that wasn’t what this was about. You want this to help heal. To bring back some life in the crypt. When it happened you recounted when you had watched Sam mess up catching an updraft and land head first in a bush, while testing an alteration to his wings. Or when Natasha had landed Steve flat on his ass a couple times in a row. And it did the trick. You weren’t telling them to forget the past. You asked questions about stories from when they all had been together. You wanted to know more about the others you hadn’t met. But it was also about finding happiness in the now. 

Hours later, three of you had not anticipated the effects of the fancy scotch. Steve remained at the end of the bar, unfazed by it all. Both Sam and Natasha stood up and tired to help with cleaning up, but it only resulted in a much larger mess. In hopes of saving the kitchen you shoed them both out and to bed. 

You had filled your last few glasses with water from the tap, trying to keep from having a hangover in the morning. That didn’t stop the mellow warmth seeping into your bones from the first few drinks you did have. You looked around the kitchen. It was a mess and needed cleaned. It was just you and Steve left, and having already taken up most of his night you turned to him to let him know he didn’t have to stay.

“Are you going to stay to clean?” He asked simply. No indication about whether he would leave or not.

You wrinkled your nose up, examining the carnage, “Yeaaaah, I need too. I cant go to bed with dirty dishes. It drives me crazy!”

“Then I’ll stay to help. I don’t have anything early in the morning,” He offered, moving his way around the island to join you by the sink. He rolled up the sleeve of the sweater he had had on, and started filling one side of the basin with hot water and soap. You went around and scraped plates off into the trash before depositing them on the counter next to him. After that you had started to dry the large dishes that were fully clean, while putting smaller ones like the plates and bowls into the dishwasher to be finished. The two of you worked silently, possibly, just possibly, enjoying the moment with just each other. 

As you worked you felt the alcohol making you limbs heavier. The two of you finished putting things in their places. You had ended up on a counter, watching his move around. He seemed much more at peace than you had ever really seen him.

“Why doesn’t it work on you?” You ask quietly.

“Hmm?”

“Alcohol? You had some, but you’re sober,” you tried to clarify.

“Its the serum they shot me full of. It gave me an extremely fast metabolism, so I cant get drunk off normal liquor,” he paused for a second before continuing, “Thor had an Asgardian liquor of some kind that could get me drunk for a short amount of time.”

You smiled a little, trying to imagine calm, cool, and collected Captain America drunk, “I’d like to see that some time.”

He looked up at you, right in your eyes. You had noticed that they were blue, but damn, in that moment they were so blue. Maybe it was because they weren’t clouded by shields he put up around himself, or maybe it was just the alcohol. You just knew you could have fallen into that blue and been happy there. 

Steve watched you, perched up on the counter. You looked relaxed, in a way he hadn’t noticed. You aren’t bristled against him, you aren’t ready to fight, instead you were saying things like how you like to see him drunk. And looking at him with eyes like those. He hadn’t noticed when exactly you managed to slip around the guards he had put around himself.

You break away first, trying to keep yourself from saying something stupid. Or doing something stupid. Leaning forward, you made to slide off the counter, but were interrupted by an outstretched hand. You followed it up back to Steve’s face, and all the way back down. Slowly you placed your own much smaller one into his palm. You felt the anticipation and uncertainty in him, but there was also a sense of ease you didn't think he'd let in a long time. After you were off the counter, you let you hand remain in his. Looking up at his face. Your friend from years ago had been right, he was the boy-next-door kind of handsome. The easy charm was there in his eyes and old school manners could melt the coldest heart.. You just hadn’t let yourself see it. More focused on being angry him. Maybe running from whatever it was that you were feeling then. 

Slowly you both pulled away. Both of you walked in opposite directions. Both fell into different beds. But, both of you found familiar faces in your dreams.


	6. Chapter 6

“Sooooooo, Agent Raithe huh?” You asked Sam coyly, as the two of you walked to the gym to join Natasha and Steve for training. You had run into him trying to nonchalantly talk to one of the more senior agents. Trying was the important part. It was clear he’d been thrown by the woman’s openness to talk to him. 

A flush crossed his cheeks as he rushed out, “Mind your own damn business, I swear you’re as bad as Nat!” 

“I have absolutely no idea what you are insinuating my friend!” Playing up a level of ignorance, “All I saw was her talking and you drooling at her with puppy eyes.” The end of your sentenced was rushed as you dodged out of Sam’s incoming punch, falling through the gym doors. 

Chasing you in, he started huffing, “I was not drooling!” 

“You were!” 

“Take it back!” He threatened, trying to get you pinned into a corner of the room. 

“Only if you tell me your intentions with the lady!” You throw back at him, ducking out of another attempt to grab you. 

“It’s,” huff, “none,” another huff, “of your damned,” huff, “business!” He’d finally gotten ahold of your arm after you had kept feinting out of his reach. You snickered at him, making no promises to stop teasing him about his new crush. In an attempt to pull away you turned just the right way for him to get you across his back. And then you were in the air for a second. The next, you were flat on the mat groaning. 

Sam’s triumphant face appeared over your head, “Next time, keep your nosy ass to your-“ and he was comically falling out of your field of view. Closely followed by a very satisfying thud on the mat next to you. Steve’s face came replaced his, along with an extended hand offering to help you up. Only with a moment's hesitation you accepted the offer. His large hand enclosed yours, spreading warmth up and through your arm. He seemed to always be so warm. You’d assumed it was a side effect of the serum he’d been given. Once standing you could see that he had his foot planted squarely in the middle of Sam’s chest, who was cursing Steve up and down for knocking his feet out from under him. 

Steve chose to ignore him and rather than throwing insults back, he asked you, “What did you do?” He sounded every bit the tired dad who hadn’t had a break in years. 

You batted your eyes innocently, “Me? Do anything to poor, old, big bird here? Why, I would never!” The added infliction at the end of the sentence drove your voice up an octave, into a much sweeter sounding version of your normal one. 

“BULLSHIT!” Came an indignant wail out of Sam, still stuck on the floor. 

Steve eyed the both of you, before sighing and lifting his foot from Sam’s chest. He lent his other hand to him, pulling the man up to his feet. Before letting go, he looked Sam straight in the eye, “We do not judo flip ladies. Got it? Keep that in mind for the agent I hear you’re drooling over.” 

He had delivered the one in the same worn out dad tone, which threw Sam. It took him a second to catch what Steve had said. Then he locked back onto you ready to go back to laying you out flat on the mat. 

Before any real damage could be done, Natasha strolled into the gym, “Ladies, you’re both pretty. There’s no need to fight.” Sam had you pulled against his chest when her comment rang through the gym. He pushed you away, mumbling something about how this is why he was trying to make friends outside of the three of you. 

“Are you sure you’re just looking to be friends with her? The dopey look on your face suggested otherwise,” you teased back at him. Sam looked close to actually committing homicide there in the middle of the compound. Stepping in between you two, Steve held up a hand and told Sam to go cool off on the weights. While intervening to prevent the upcoming attempt on your life, Steve has positioned himself close to you, gently grabbed your arm just below your elbow. The touch immediately pulled all your attention from Sam, redirecting it to the warmth from the massive hand on your arm. For the second time in only a few days, Steve rendered you close to stone. Your body froze. Maybe out of shock. Or maybe out of hopes he wouldn’t pull away soon. It didn’t seem to register to Steve, as he let go to talk to Natasha about plans for the session, but your reaction didn’t go unnoticed by Sam. 

His eyes lit up at the chance to really get back at you. In slow motion you watched as he opened his mouth to say something undoubtedly very stupid and very embarrassing. Without a second though you ripped off you of your shoes and took aim at his head. It landed with a satisfying thunk, straight to the middle of Sam’s face. 

“Alright,” the word taking on a very fed up tone, “the two of you, three miles go!” Steve left no room in the sentence for either of you to argue, as he turned to the two of you. 

“Aye, aye Captain!” You respond, tugging on your chosen projectile that Sam had immediately lobbed back at your own face. 

“Excuse me?” Steve asked halting in the middle of a step to turn back to Natasha. A flush instantly fell across the tops of your cheeks, warming your face. 

“Nothing!” You sing while rushing to the track to start laps, Sam not far behind you. His cheeks were puffed out, like he had caught himself in the middle of a laugh, instead he’d chosen to not let it out. Trying Steve didn’t seem like that great of an idea. Under his breathe, as the two of you fell into pace, he whispered something suspiciously like I can’t hear you. As you both made progress through the miles, you felt eyes on you, but every time you looked up Steve and Natasha were both in the middle of weights. Neither really paying attention to you. 

After completing the last lap of your third mile, Steve started you on a kick boxing routine, to help strengthen strikes and kicks. It was the only thing he trained you solo in. In fact, since your first few weeks, it was the only training he had given you. Most of your recent sessions had been group work outs, with all four of you giving pointers to each other. For parts of those sessions, Natasha would take the lead and give you specific things to help round out your skill set. Be it grappling or ranged attacks. Sam also at times would pull you to the side to work on something he’d noticed. But Steve never did.   
When you had first trained with him, his very technical attitude in training had felt cold, like you nothing more than an annoyance to him. And maybe you had been, on purpose or not. But with the past few months of more individual training, and getting to see his personality outside of training, it now seemed more like efficiency. Precision. He didn’t give you more instruction than you needed or more guidance than necessary. Instead, he opted to let you fail on your own, before giving you a suggestion on how to approach what you were struggling with. He hadn’t ever been uncaring or indifferent. In fact, he had been acutely aware of what you needed during training and he still was. You expected Natasha to be very good at reading people, but you hadn’t considered it of Steve until very recently. 

In the middle of a rounding strike on the bag in front of you, a hand wrapped around the space just above your elbow, following Steve’s clear voice “Pull this down, you're coming from the side. Not from above.” Swallowing hard, you shove down the fluttering in your stomach, focusing on the correction he had given you. An amused huff came out of the man behind you as you adjusted your swing, “What? No sassy remark? I’ve never known you to stay quiet.” 

The flopping feeling in your middle sent a rush of red to creep up your neck. You licked your lips, keeping your eyes straight ahead on the faded area of the bag in front of you, “Well— uh, last time it happened I sent your ass across the gym and I got kicked out of training.” You landed a hit squarely in the middle of the bag, “Not sure how many other sessions there are,” another hit, “So I’m trying to stay in this one.” Your last hit was harder than you meant, causing the bag to swing slightly as you pushed some of the nervous energy building up inside of you. Your knuckles stung, even though the wrapping you had done on it. Pulling your hand in against your middle, your eyes hit the mat. You shouldn’t have let your feelings out like that. Steve stepped out and around you, going to steady the bag. Again, the feeling of eyes on you caused your own to flick up to his face. He watched you carefully, like he was assessing you, before reaching out slowly and pulling your hand closer to him. Nothing was said from either of you as he started undoing the athletic tape. As the layers started to shed, red started to seep through the bandaging over your last two knuckles. A frown crossed Steve’s face as he noticed it. 

“It’s okay,” quickly fell out of your mouth, “I did it to myself.” Out of embarrassment about losing control and the fact that you’d gone and hurt yourself, you tried to pull your hand out of his grasp. Only for his fingers to tighten around your wrist. His mouth remained where it had settled as he continued pulling away at the tape. When the last of it finally fell away, you both could see splits across the top of each knuckle. Neither were bleeding heavy, but you would have to wait a couple of days before you’d be back at the bag. Part of you felt your heart sink, the one on one training with Steve would stop while they healed, but it would also give you time to pull yourself together and not keep acting like a fool around him. 

A long breathe left Steve, still holding onto your wrist, “You won't need stitches.” Efficient. Practical. Matter of fact. Everything Steve was. Completely unaffected by the world around him, missing how he was currently twisting your stomach in knots. Everything that had rubbed you wrong to begin with. 

“Eh, I wouldn’t have gotten them anyways. They itch to bad,” the reply doesn’t come out in the nonchalant way you had wanted it to. Again, you try to pull you hand back, this time he lets go of it, taking the heat building in you as it dropped away. Dejectedly, you turned in hopes of hiding your inner struggle from him. “Thank you, though.” 

Burning in the middle of your back caused you to turn, you caught his eyes on you again, not sure if they were backlit by fire or ice. Still devastatingly blue. He cleared his throat as his eyes fell from your face, “As for training,” he stopped, seeming to be considering his next words, “I think it's a much better fit for you here.” Then you were falling back into blue as he watched your face very carefully. “You’re doing really well here,” he added calmly. This time his matter of factness caused your chest to constrict. 

He never told you more than you needed and he always seemed to know what you needed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this one is a little short, I have more coming soon.


	7. Chapter 7

Since the dinner night, things in the compound started to be less tense. You didn’t round every corner waiting to run into Steve and be met with his icy facade. Instead, you found yourself hoping maybe he would be there. Heart beating a storm of emotions into life in your chest, only to have it stutter out when it was just you alone in the concrete hallways. Then you’d mentally curse yourself out for indulging the stupid crush. The night had been a success in other ways too. Sam had started to offer too make dinner on random nights in the week and you’d try to do at least a meal or two. It was rare for all four of you to actually end up in the kitchen all together. Steve and Natasha had more on their plates do to sharing the duties of co-directors at the compound. They both had to manage training schedules, mission planning and execution, along with who knew what else. You had pointed it out to Sam one night after he had returned from another recon mission and was helping you wash dishes from the omelet you’d made him to goad him into staying awake for a bit. 

“They never stop! I know you don't either, but I do know that you at least sleep and eat on the regular.” 

“Both of them needed something to do. They both chose to not go live a normal life, so they kinda just invested everything into keeping this place running smoothly,” he had shrugged. You could tell there was more than just that too it. Neither one of them really talked about their private lives, not that they really seemed to have them. While you had caught Sam in the act of trying to talk up one of the Agents, you’d never heard anything of Steve or Natasha pursuing their own relationships. They also almost never left the compound; Natasha had only been gone a handful of days in the past few months you’d been there. Steve, to your knowledge, didn’t leave at all. 

“No life is normal,” you answer back to him, “Doesn’t mean you give up and just work.” 

Sam looked up at you from the dish he had been scrubbing, “Want to go tell them that? I tried for a while to get Steve to find his own version. Nat straight up let hers walk away from her. This is what they wanted.” This is what they wanted. To be two ghosts floating around in all the walls they had built up around themselves. The thought of it made your chest ache. Probably Sam’s too, you could see the corners of his mouth pulled into a tight frown. The subject was obviously a sore one for more than just Natasha and Steve. 

“Maybe we should get a dog,” you offered after a minute or two, trying to lighten the mood. Maybe bring Sam’s normal smile back to his face. 

“Oh, I like your line of thinking! It’d definitely be a better wing man then you or Steve for sure. Neither of you have any game, that's part of the issue,” the end of his reply came with a mischievous smile, insinuating something you weren’t even going to touch with a ten-foot pole. But his smile was back at least. 

———————— 

The seasons outside took a dramatic shift at the end of November and so did life at the compound. The trees that had been beautiful shades of gold and red had suddenly chosen to turn brown, the skies seemed overcast more days than blue, and the temperature started dropping rapidly as the world shifted into winter. 

With the temperatures falling, the entire compound seemed to have become a large slab of ice and you felt like a fish set out for sale. Natasha had placed you in charge of some very basic duties, mostly just paper pushing. None of it was glamorous, most of it actually being completely mind numbing, but it had allowed her to let go of some of the thousands of responsibilities she normally carried. You’re training had continued, but Sam had been gone more recently on recon missions, a pretty large bust was about to happen so the more intel that could be collected, the better. It seemed like he’d get back late into the night and turn around to leave almost immediately. Steve’s training group had also just gone through a fill revision, the remaining agents close to being cleared for field work. You knew because you had been the one to stamp each and every one of their files indicating so. 

In all your months at the compound you had not ever asked what your position was meant to be. When you had started it seemed like you had been intended a typical field agent, just one who lived. But that had seemed to have died a fiery death when you had been removed from group training. Now you felt a little in limbo. You weren’t a typical agent, but you couldn’t really be an Avenger either. They didn’t exist anymore. Only as ghosts walking up and down the halls. In truth, you figured at some point you’d be cleared to fill a position similar to Sam. Not as high up, but someone above the typical agent. Yet, you never asked, instead you kept pushing papers and waited for when someone was ready to tell you. 

That someone was Natasha. In the middle of intel training. Two more people had been removed from the original group, with their seats quickly being replaced by a man and a woman you recognized from your brief stint in group fitness training. They had been in there for a week when Natasha dropped much slimmer files than normal in front of each of you. 

And the world tilted. 

All the others quickly went to open the files, hoping to get extra moments in to absorb the information before Natasha pulled them away and made you all recite them line for line. You didn’t need to open it to know what they were. Why they were so light. One by one, the men and women around you stared at the first page. Each had a picture of themselves staring back. A neat, red cleared stamped over the top of their personal information. The ones you had stamped. Under it were the introduction report for a field mission. Nothing crazy. Simple recon. You all had made thousands of walk throughs for a mission just like the one they were about to go on. 

They were about to go on. Not you. 

Your file would have no picture of you staring back. No personal information being distorted by a neat, red cleared. Just the mission outline. A hole of nothingness punctured through your chest as you watched the people you had help push to where they were now, finally seeing the payoff for their hard work. Natasha’s voice filled the room as she congratulated all of you. Told you how proud she was. How you deserved this. But everything sounded echo-y, like you were listening to her talk to you in your room from the kitchen. As she continued with detailing the mission and moved into running a play by play to get them ready, you stared at the plain front of the file glaring back at you. Everyone had something to say. Something to add. Not you. Silence crept in as they droned on around you. 

  
How did you deserve this? 

—————————— 

Following the meeting, you had retreated to your room. Natasha had closed the session with instructions to be at the hanger at 5 am the next day. Everyone else had stood up and shook hands with each other and Natasha; you had slipped out the door before anyone could notice. Now all you could do was stare at yourself in your bathroom mirror. Whatever you were meant to do here, it hadn’t been what you had been aiming for. Agent wasn’t meant to stand out in front of your name in a file. Maybe you were just the comic relief. Someone meant to bring a little light to a dark situation. But that fucking sucked. 

The tear in your chest seemed to be working itself bigger and bigger the longer you glared yourself down. Standing there was only going to end up with you making the walls shake out of frustration. Which would make someone ask you what was wrong. And then you’d have to admit that you had failed. 

Instead, you found yourself standing in front of a target. Bullet after bullet ripped through the center. Natasha’s voice echoed around your head, “Pull the trigger in between breathes.” Bullet. “Both eyes open, the best shots use both eyes.” Bullet. “Shoot through the target, not to it.” Bullet. Bullet. Bullet. As the barrel of the gun remained hot in your hand, the target in front of you hung in shreds down the range. At some point you had stopped caring about tight, perfect shots. Why should you, you’d never leave the concrete walls of the compound. A snarl ripped through you as you hit the button to pull the tattered paper to you. Ripping it down you replace it for the fourth time, before sending it out further. 

At some point the bullets run out. In their place, you pull tactical knives from a cabinet on the wall and position yourself in front of a heavily abused target dummy. Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. Rapid fire you throw three knives into the head. It rocks a bit on the base before settling. Anger boiling in your veins flows out your hands propelling the knives a little bit faster and a little bit harder. Natasha had pushed you to figure out how to let the energy flow from you to another thing. It had started with knives flying every which way. One landing to close to her foot, but she hadn’t even flinched. Instead she had plucked it out of the floor and handed it back to you. Reminding you to breathe through the throw and to control how much you were putting into it. Eventually, you had gotten to the point where you could throw a knife straight through the dummy. When you had turned, expecting more feedback on the throw, you’d found her beaming at you instead, “With a skill like that, you could turn anything into a knife.” A wicked twinkle had worked its way into her eyes, making you wonder what all she had made do with in the past. You told her you weren’t so sure, and her reply had been that if you push or throw anything hard enough, at some point it would become a knife. The joke had started a game where you’d point something out to her and ask if it was a knife, resulting in you both laughing. Steve and Sam had found the joke much less amusing after you threatened to use a frying pan as one on Sam during a dinner night. 

Now you felt like anything other than laughing. All the work you had done was for nothing. The control you’d started to build up with your abilities. Figuring out how to harness it. For nothing. To be left in the dust by people who also got to leave the compound. Who had other homes to go to. Families to laugh with. 

And you were stuck in a cage with nowhere to go. 

  
———————— 

  
The shift in your attitude doesn’t go unnoticed by Natasha the next morning as you stood beside her and Steve, watching as the team of five load into a quintet with Sam geared up in his Falcon wings. He’d given both Steve and Natasha a hug but hadn’t extended the gesture to you. Instead he’d squeezed your arm before turning to join the group. He might as well have slapped you across the face. 

“Spit it out,” she said, eyes trained on the jet disappearing into the clouds. 

“Nothing to share.” 

“You know,” her head turned to you, “I don’t need your little Jedi mind tricks to tell that your pissed.” 

“Yeah, yeah. Super spy,” the reply was dry. 

“No,” a perfectly manicured finger tapped your cheek, “Your face is too good at telling me. And I found your mess on the target range from last night.” 

You narrowed your eyes while glaring at the floor, you refused to look at her. Refused to answer her. 

An airy sigh left her, she was feeling awfully theatrical for it being so early and you being so angry, “Had you considered there being a reason you weren’t cleared for this mission.” 

“No shit,” you snapped, finally looking her in the face, “I got that there’s a reason I’m still here.” Not good enough. Not in control. Not ready. Anger and hurt competed with each other inside you for dominance. 

Another sigh, “There’s a place for you here—“ 

“I’m sure there is, but it feels like I am always going to be stuck here,” the sentence tasted sour in your mouth, it’s to truthful, but you needed to say it. 

Natasha’s lips pursed; a little bit of her old sadness seem to fall over her. “Look, things are difficult. You aren’t a regular agent. You’re not someone any of the three of us here are ready to just through out into the world.” 

Her words feel like a whip on your fragile self-esteem. All you can eek out back to her is a dejected yeah. 

“I am trying to get someone here who can help you more. She’s better with your kind of stuff.” 

“Wanda, right?” At the mention of her name, a roll of concern let loose out of Steve who had remained silent. 

Her head bobbed in response, “It’s tricky. Asking her to come back. Well her and Bucky. At one point we all promised just a couple of months while things settled. Then all of the sudden it's been three years.” Her eyes again had a faraway look to them. One that had been gone for a while. She looked like she was trying to imagine herself with someone that wasn’t there. You didn’t follow everything she was talking about, but it was pretty clear that it hurt to talk about it. More sadness seemed to be leaking off of her. The ache it caused in your heart was almost too much. If it had been a day before then maybe you would have reached a hand out to offer her comfort, or to ease some of her sadness out of her bones. But it wasn’t. It was the day you had been forced to accept that you were going to fade away from the world like they had. It had been the two fo them who had chosen not to clear you. Despite both of them telling you how well you were doing. They had chosen to keep you in the concrete crypt with them and all their ghosts. Natasha pressed on after a moment, “But I need some other people to join the program before that can happen.” Her eyes cut across the top of your head to land on Steve on the other side of you. Your own followed hers. 

His lips were pressed into a thin line, like he was refusing to acknowledge either of you. It was one of the few times you were able to really look at him without it being weird. Everything about him radiated a solid strength, from his high cheek bones to his jaw line covered by his beard. It had gotten long, so had his hair. Both were always carefully groomed, with his hair being pushed back, it started to curl a little at the nape of his neck. Such a small detail, the little curl, but it was something that made him still feel human. Not just the perfect soldier he’d been made into. A short gust of wintery air whipped through the now empty hanger. It pulled at a lock of his hair, just slightly, but you were so tempted to reach out and fix it for him. While another part of you felt like screaming at him. To rip him apart for keeping you grounded. 

He must have felt your eyes on him, he’d slowly turned and angled his face to you. Catching your eyes in taking all the little pieces of him in. He watched you back just as intently for a moment before lifting his eyes to look at Natasha. Good thing, maybe he’d missed the flush warming the tops of your cheeks. He’d caught you looking. 

“If they wanted to come back then they would have,” is all he said to her. 

She didn’t seem to like his answer, her lips sliding in a frown, “Maybe it’s time that we all started being honest with ourselves.” 

“What is there to be honest about?” Steve asked, it sounded like a challenge. You felt his icy exterior start to fall into place. A defensiveness settling over him. His own shield against the past. 

“That we all ran away,” Natasha’s clipped tone letting onto her own mixed emotions about their past choices. Steve didn’t respond to her. And you didn’t dare say anything. Standing there between living legends, you felt their fear. Both carried scars from the past that made them scared to move on to the future. Both of them were ready to quickly build walls up between themselves and the world. To isolate themselves. And there you stood with them, feeling your own start to form. 

“There’s no point in asking her here,” you say finally, “We all know I’m not leaving this compound. That choice has been made. Don’t dig up the past to try and make this better.” With that you turned and left the two of them in the hanger. They were so caught up in their own pain, they had missed that they’d damned you to their own fate. 

As you walked away, Steve tracked you with his eyes. He’d noticed how you had stood back from everyone as the team had prepared to leave, instead of your usual place right in the middle. The fire that normally burned in you seemed stamped out, resentment taking its place in your eyes. Even when he’d felt you watching him, you didn’t have the burning passion that typically accompanied your anger. Instead you’d just seemed a little hollow. A little bit like how he felt before you showed up. Angry with the world and ready to push it all away so he didn’t have to feel anything anymore. Natasha was right. He had run away. 

Natasha cut into his thoughts as he continued to watch you disappear behind a door, “She’s angry.” 

“I hadn’t noticed,” he snorted back. 

Her eyes narrowed at him as her arms crossed over her chest, “It’s not funny. We can’t keep her here; she should have been on that mission.” 

The whole thing gave him a headache. His eyes fell shut as he pinched the bridge of his nose, “Nat, it just not… not the time. She’s not ready.” 

“She’s not ready? Or you’re not ready?” She challenged. 

“What are you getting at?” He looked up at her, surprised by her accusation. 

It was her turn to look fed up. She waved a hand in the direction you had left, “You watch her constantly. Ready to be there if she needs something —“   
“It’s my job,” he forced out flatly. A burning in his chest made it feel like maybe that was not the whole truth to it. 

“Come on!” Natasha retorted, while throwing her hands up and letting them smack back down against her legs, “You both work your way under each other's skin!” 

It was true, but he couldn’t figure out why. You’d shown up with so much in you. Bursting with life and sass and anger. You’d filled up space that he hadn’t even noticed was empty. Everything that came out of your mouth felt like a challenge to him. Like you couldn’t wait for the chance to get a rise out of him. And it scared him. Constantly, you were through him for the loop, he was always unsure of what was going to come out of your mouth before you’d laugh at his reaction. For the past few years it was like he had been asleep. Just moving through the motions of the half-life he was living. So many people had been lost and he felt guilty for moving on. From Peggy who he had never gotten to have. He’d lost her over and over and over. When he went in the ice. When she had died an old woman. When Natasha and Sam and Bucky and everyone had stopped him from going back in time. She had found her own happy ending. She had accomplished so much in his name. Because of his sacrifice and he couldn’t take that from her. He couldn’t have that. And everything following the Snap had taken a toll on him. It had hardened him. Pushed part of him so far down, he’d stopped being aware of it. 

But you had single handedly woken him up. You’d shown up and worked to prove yourself. Wormed your way into his life. Into all of their lives. You had brought a warmth back to them with all the energy in you. He found himself drawn to you like a moth to a candle. Everything about you felt new and refreshing. Like the first breathe he had taken after the serum. After coming out of the ice. After surviving the impossible. So maybe a small part of him was scared to let you walk out of his line of sight. Because if you left and didn’t come back, surely everything would fall apart. He’d lose the part of himself that wanted to walk into the gym and find you laughing. Tossing your head back with a wide smile that glowed. He’d lose the part of himself that ate more because he went to the kitchen in hopes of running into you humming while you made dinner. He’d lose his reason to be part of the world again. 

But now you looked more like the old version of himself. Cold. Distant. Maybe he had started to take away your reason for remaining the spot of sunshine in their lives. “She has a way of working herself into every little thing,” is all he could get himself to admit. 

Natasha’s eyes closely watched his face, finding the little truths he was refusing to share, “You can't keep her here because you’re scared, Steve. It will make her hate you.” 

All he could do was nod back to her. She was right. And above anything else, the thought of you truly hating would be worse than loosing you.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter, I think, is going to be in a similar vein of angst. there's things that everyone needs to work out. I hope you're all enjoying it!


	8. Chapter 8

Even though you tried to keep the sudden emptiness you felt to yourself, it seemed to be leaking out. Spilling into every part of your life. The mission had been a success, the team had completed it without any commotion, returning three days later. During the debrief you had snapped harshly anytime a question was directed at you. You had been relegated to filing their individual reports, just a glorified secretary. The usual patience and want to help that you carried around with you had dried up inside your chest. It's not that you were trying to be confrontational, but suddenly being aware that you had no real control over the rest of your life was eating at you. You felt like screaming and breaking things. A small part of you worried about how intense everything felt, it was like you couldn’t get a grasp on what was going on in your head. Everything was harder. Days passed without you really showering or eating much. If you weren’t in training sessions, you were sleeping. 

One night, Natasha had come to try and get you to go to dinner. She had knocked softly on your door, expecting it to be open. Instead it was locked. She had repeated your name a couple of times, tried to entice you with a Sam’s lasagna, and told you that they all missed you. In response you buried your head further into the pillows and blocked her out until she gave up. You needed space. 

Physical training took a downwards turn too. With how agitated you were, more and more often you started letting out aggressive energy into hits that you landed on whoever you were sparring with. Every time it happened, you ended up throwing yourself and Natasha several feet from each other. Each time the distance became farther and farther. Her face became more and more twisted and you felt more like a loose cannon. She finally called the session after you had performed a strike that hit her in the shoulder. Unlike the past ones that blasted you both opposite ways, it had locked her arm up, paralyzing it for a minute. Worry replaced the anger in the of the gaping hole in your chest, and her arm released finally. You had tried to apologize profusely while she just waved you off, but she informed you that you were on a break. No training for a week. 

That alone felt like a blow to the stomach. What the hell were you supposed to do now? You were locked in a box that you weren’t ever going to leave. Now you couldn’t even do anything with your time. After that, you didn’t leave your room for three days. You had heard Natasha and Sam at one point outside your door. 

“It’s bad. Like when he did this, I just don't know how to help her get out of it,” Natasha’s soft tone should have made your heart ache, but the nothingness swallowed it before you could really acknowledge the feeling. You didn’t know what would help either. 

“She’s putting up walls. We all did it.” 

“It’s our fault, though,” The pain kept twisting in your chest. You knew you were hurting them. Shutting them out didn’t help anyone but it hurt to bad to let anyone in either. They both eventually left you door, left you to hollowness. 

———————— 

On the fourth night, you finally had to drag yourself to the kitchen. If you ate, then maybe part of the hollow feeling in you would go away. All you were dressed in was an oversized hoodie and sleep boxers, and you couldn’t remember the last time you changed. The concrete floors seemed to be pulling whatever warmth was left in your body, out through the bottoms of your feet. Let it have it, you whisper in your head. The kitchen had never felt so far away, it could have miles at that point. It felt like it was. But finally, you make your way to the door. It was dark, the lights were off, transforming the normally homey room into a black cave. You don't reach out to flick the lights on, instead you shuffle into the dark. Let it swallow me whole. Most things get put back in their right places, you could get whatever without the lights. You couldn’t handle them at the moment. Taking longer than normal, you manage to find a bag of chips. Sinking to the floor in between the cabinets and island, your eyelids seemed weighed down despite your many hours of sleep. Pulling the bag open was a struggle, everything was a struggle. When the first chip hit your tongue, it didn’t taste right. More like nothing that it normally would. But you could handle nothing. So, you ate them in the dark. 

Moments or years later, the lights flooded the darkness, causing a flash of red as it filtered through your eyelids. It made the comfort you found there in the darkness, disappear. You could hear feet walking into the room and then stop. Not wanting to acknowledge who was there you kept your eyes closed. If you don't see them, then they would go away. They’d leave you alone. The person said nothing but started to move around the kitchen. They didn’t disturb you, just went about their own business. Until you heard them sit on the floor across from you, leaning against the island. Still they didn't say anything, just allowed you to drift in and out of feeling on the cold floor. Clear clinks of metal against ceramic would ring out occasionally. Time passed. You were not sure how long before you heard ceramic scrape concrete, like a bowl being set on the floor, and a shallow huff leave the person across from you. 

“I’m fine,” you croaked out. Maybe if you acknowledged them, then they’d go away. “Seriously, I’ll be fine.” 

“That’s two different statements,” the voice responded, and it almost dragged some new feeling out of the emptiness. When had you become to empty? Sighing, you slowly cracked your eye lids open. There he was. “It’s fine with me if you aren’t either,” he adds. 

You continued to watch him, “Steve just — just let it be.” Please don’t leave. 

It was all you could get yourself to say. Part of you wanted to tell him to go. Part of you wanted to scream for him to stay. Neither felt like something you really could do. 

“Nat told me about the new trick,” he pushed on. 

God. Everything hurt, that statement felt like someone had put a knife in your chest. You’d hurt her. Not on purpose, but you had. The shock and fear had shot out of her when it happened. It had been the first time in a while that you had noticed someone else’s feeling. You’d been so caught up in your own. Her reaction had replayed in your head over and over. You’d done that. She didn’t deserve that. Remembering made your face twist, as if trying to push the memory away. 

“She forgives you by the way, so quit beating yourself up over it,” again, he wouldn’t just let it go. Couldn’t he see that you were hurt enough. 

“And what if I don't want to.” I want to stop, I can’t. 

“Then you’re gonna become a shell of a person and actually be stuck here the rest of your life.” Oh, the irony. The conversation with Sam shot into your mind. “You have to keep moving forward, get control of it.” 

“Of what?!” You hissed out at him. Your eyes flew open and met his. When was it that they had stopped being so icy to you? When had the ice worked its way into your chest? 

He watched you from the other side of the small area. You were cross legged with chips sitting in your lap. The large sweatshirt you had on seemed to be swallowing you whole, so close to disappearing. He could tell you hadn’t showered in a while; your skin was blotchy, and your hair looked like you would have to cut off the massive knot forming in the bun on the top of your head. The skin under your eyes was a deep purple, like when he’d gotten his nose broken in an ally fight ninety something years ago and had developed matching black eyes. He’s seen the person sitting in front of him. He seen them in the mirror. For years. The angry hollowness that somehow takes root and fills every space in you. Forces you into a routine, while shoving everything else out of your life. He knew that face and he knew those eyes. Feral and ready to attack. Because the hurt was so bad that you couldn’t let anyone near you. How long had he looked that person in the mirror? How many years of just being the empty shell of himself, throwing everything he had into work. Letting the people around him become strangers. He’d been hollow and cold. 

Until spitfire had walked into the compound. Someone with their own pain, but they kept it with them to try and help others. It kept them human. It had forced him to be human again. You had forced him to be human again. You had melted the ice around his heart. You had brought life back into the compound. You got Natasha to smile a real smile again. And to get Sam to cook again. 

Now, here you were, drowning in the cold hollowness. It broke his heart, the pain weaving its way around his chest. He wondered if you felt it. Normally you were so aware of when he let an emotion slip around you. But it didn't seem like you could feel it now. There was too much hollow in you. 

“Let’s go spar,” he said finally, ignoring your question completely. 

“I don’t want to. I want to go back to bed,” you ground out at him. 

“That’s not the option I gave you.” 

“I’m not going to spar with you.” 

“What? Are you too chicken shit?” He quipped at you. The comment was like a slap in the face, you hadn’t expected to hear that come out of his mouth. “Scared you might hurt me? I don’t really think you’d be able to,” he goaded. Steve tried to keep his face neutral, not let through how he enjoyed watching your eyes get bigger as he gave you back the sass you would typically dish out in heaps. Or how he could see that fire you normally carried in you start to relight. 

“I am not chicken shit,” you tried to throw back. It wasn’t not up to your usual standard for sass. 

“Then prove it.” 

——————————— 

  
Despite the achiness in your chest, you found yourself standing in front of Steve. He’d walked with you to your room to let you change into real clothes. And then with you to the private training room. He never said anything during that time, but you felt his eyes on you. Nothing else though. No emotions. You hadn’t felt anyone else’s in a while. It worried you a bit. Where they gone? Had you lost touch with it? 

During the day the compound was pretty silent, maybe in the East wing there would be noise as people went about their day, but overall it was quiet. At night though, the walls seemed to absorb all sound. It was overwhelming, the silence. You had lost yourself in a spiral of nothingness as the two of you maneuvered through the halls. Only when you had reached the doors to the gym did it start to slip away. Steve had very gently reached out and grabbed your elbow to keep you from walking right past it. He stayed silent, but his eyes held a softness in them, like he was inviting you in. Only half of the lights in the room turned on, causing small pools of illumination to be scattered across the floor. For something so small, the gesture pulled at your insides. He must have noticed how the kitchen lights had overwhelmed you. 

Now, the two of you were standing facing each other. Neither moving or really in a stance to fight. 

“Steve, this is stupid. Its late. I’m tired,” you mumbled out. The fire at his earlier words had died out again. You just felt exhausted. 

“You’re only saying that because you know I’m going to win,” he threw back with a cocky tone. 

A spark lit in your chest, “You so sure about that?” 

“I’ve got over a hundred pounds, and half a foot on you,” he retorted. 

“And I can still throw you across the room if I want.” 

“Then let’s see it,” he gestured with his hands for you to come at him. 

That’s all it took, you sunk down into a wider stance and started to slowly move towards him. He matched your posture, it looked like a natural position for him. His body moved so fluidly for a man so large. He was in his element. But so were you. Training with Natasha had resulted in her fighting style showing itself in your own moves. Compared to where you started, you now had complete confidence in a match. The two of you continued to circle each other for a second, at which Steve cocked an eyebrow up at you. A silent challenge. The fire in your chest flamed, and you rushed forward. The strike you had aimed only missed his chest by a breath as he twisted to dodge. One arm swung around, swatting at the middle of your back. He bounced backwards and brought his hands back up in front of him. His returned strike had echoed in your chest causing you to groan as you were pushed back a foot or so. It hadn’t been his full strength, but he wasn’t going easy. 

As you rounded back on him, he had a stupid, cocky smile pulling at the corner of his mouth. You rushed him again. And again. And again. Each time the hits landed and with them, the anger hidden in all your emptiness leaked out to him. And he took it. Let you push the pain onto him. He never went on the offensive, only playing defense. After a while, you were getting fed up. No one was winning here. It was just a fucking stand still. You could feel your own frustration burning hot in your chest. 

Once again you rushed him. This time though you dodged right, before reversing and going left. As you had expected, he’d started moving his left arm to swat you away. It was now in the perfect place to swing yourself up and land him in an arm bar. You moved swiftly through the arm and secured you locked feet across his neck. Arching your back, you used his weight against him. Both of you start falling to the floor. His right arm reached over to grab ahold of you anywhere to free his left. You arched further and press the back of your knee around his throat. When you hit the floor, it loosened your grip a bit. You scrambled to regain control in the position. While Steve started to flex his arm to break your hold. You pulled harder, pushing your hips into the back of his elbow. Trying to straighten out his arm. While your focused on that, he rolled and was back on his feet, now with you latched onto his left arm with just your shoulders touching the ground. The two of you made eye contact. Both trying so hard to prevent the other from wining. Steve then started to lift his left arm, you included. Your back left the ground and you were in the air again. Without a solid support, you knew you were going to lose the grip you had on him. You tried one last time to arch and straighten him arm, gritting your teeth, feeling the fire in your chest start to race down your arms. Don’t fucking let him win. Don’t let him be right that you weren’t ready. It didn’t work. As he regained control of his arm, you lost control of the inferno in you. Like a rubber band all the emotions you had been holding down in yourself surfaced and crossed form you to him. It felt like a never ending well of anger and pain. Everything you had worked for had been for nothing. He’d told you this was where you belonged. That you were doing well. Only to take it back by not clearing you. By locking the cage around you. Energy pulsed out of your palms and across his skin. His arm then locked, followed by the rest of him. His face contorted in pain and he let out a groan. But he took it, like your earlier hits. 

Just as quickly, dread over intentionally hurting him whipped through you. It wasn’t his fault. It was yours. And here you were hurting him for your failure. Your hands ripped away from his skin. When they were off his, the pain seemed to leave Steve, his whole-body slumping. Both of you going down again. Whatever wave of energy you had sent to him, snapped back at you. You didn’t have time to worry about falling because you were too concerned with the feeling of being burned alive. It rolled over you again and again. The difference in the feeling of all-consuming anger and hurt felt like it would swallow you whole after the past couple of days of growing hollowness. Your lungs felt like they weren’t filling with air. Your heartbeat wildly. Your eyes must have been closed or maybe you just couldn’t see, trying to block out everything. Make it go away. Make it stop. Please. Make it stop. Just make it go away- 

“Y/N! Y/N come back! Come on! Y/N fight it!” 

Steve. Steve was there. Somewhere. Steve 

“Come on! It’s in your head! You’re doing it! Let go!” 

It couldn’t be in your head. It felt so real. It hurt so bad. Nothing that hurt this bad could not be real. It burned. 

“Y/N come back to me,” something warm touched your face. 

That’s nice. It makes it hurt less. 

“Come on, come back,” Steve kept repeating to you as he held your face in his hand. The other was combing through your hair. After you had let go of him, taking the burning feeling with you, you’d hit the mat hard and start to convulse. The sight of your body moving on its own and your eyes wide but seeing nothing, shook him to his core. He pulled himself up to you, calling out your name. Whatever was happening, it scared him. The pain that had been passed to him was nothing like he ever felt. It burned like the ice water had when he’d crashed the plane into it all those years ago. The feeling had locked him in place. And then you fell, and it all went with you, like he could feel it being sucked out through your palms on his arm. “Please, please just open your eyes. I’m here. You’re not alone. Come back,” he groaned. 

Something small in the back of your mind was whispering to you to just give up. Let it take over, burn you inside out and just stop being. But there was that other voice. It didn’t sound like you, it was deeper. Rumbling like a storm. It kept asking you to come back. 

Where am I? Where do I need to go back to? It just hurts. 

Maybe you should just let it have you. Everything had been hurting. You felt like pieces of yourself had been chipping off. Falling into cracks around you. You wouldn’t be able to get them all back, you knew that. Parts of you were gone for good. 

“Please, doll. Please.” 

There was the voice again. It sounded nice. Comforting. And you could feel warmth against your face. Like someone was running their thumb across your cheek. It had been a while since you’d had any real human touch that wasn’t sparring, it was nice. 

Keep doing that, it’s makes it easier. A part of you whispers back to the voice. Just keep doing that. 

Steve could feel his hands shaking, he didn’t really know what to do to help. Nothing had happened to you. It was whatever feelings you had pushed into him. Then you took them back. You had looked at him, terrified when you had realized you’d inflicted that pain on him. You had looked so determined to make it stop. So determined to carry all that pain on your own. He assumed it’s what you had been feeling, or what you hadn’t let yourself feel. In that moment it had just come out. It’s what you had needed. A chance to let all that anger and pain escape. But you took it all back and were now letting it consume you. 

His thumb kept making circles against your cheek as he pleaded with you too let the pain go, “Let go of it. You don't need it. Just let go.” 

Just let get. Let go of you? Or the pain? 

At that moment they felt the same. There wasn’t any difference between you and it. But Steve wouldn’t tell you to let go of yourself. He’d found you alone in the dark kitchen and pissed you off until you’d fight back like you used too. He’d tried to pull you back into yourself. He wouldn’t tell you to let yourself go. Just the pain. Just like you’d seen him trying to do. 

Just let go. 

A shaky breath left your body as it stilled. You could feel you toes. Your fingers. And the hand on your face and the one in your hair. Steve’s warmth was right there next to you. He was so close. He’d pulled you back. And you felt the tears falling from your eyes. Steve almost couldn’t breathe. He watched you breathe as tears leaked from your eyes. He felt like crying too. You came back. 

A flurry of emotions hit you. Your own. Steve’s. All of it. They mixed and tangled up and pulled at each other. And you felt it all. Sitting up your surprised by how close he was. Practically sitting on you, he’d kneeled on your right side. His hands were still cupping you face gently, watching you so carefully with wide eyes. The tears streaking down your face wouldn’t stop. You’d spent to long trying to keep them in. And here you were crying all over Captain America himself. Out of embarrassment you tried to pull away from him, tried to let his hands fall from you face. Even thought it was the last thing you wanted. His hands did fall, but only to your shoulders as you twisted your back to him. It was a poor attempt at shutting him out. Steve gently pulled you backwards, as he sat back on the mat. There wasn’t enough fight in you to resist him. He tucked you into his chest, where you turned your head and continued to cry. Heaving sobs rattle through you. You let it all out. Everything you’d held in. The past life of running. Never having a home. The future where you’d never have the family you’d thought. The fear of what that all meant. The fear that you would just become another ghost roaming the halls. 

The emotional storm the two of you were sitting in tugged at Steve’s chest. He’d closed himself off for so long, he had thought he wouldn’t feel this kind of connection again. He felt for others. Wanted to help others. He wanted to do what was right. But it had all become a chore. Just something to do as he hardened his heart away from the world that took the life, he wanted from him. Taken away Peggy. And Bucky. It had thrown him into a chaotic and uncertain world that was completely foreign. And all he’d done since he woke up was fight. Fight for people. Fight with people. Fight against people. Then when they found the time stone, he thought he might have had a way back to the life he’d imagined. But it wasn’t an option he could take. She had found her own life. Made something of herself and he couldn’t take that form her. She had grown past him. So, he stayed, but disappeared from the world. He couldn’t be its savior anymore. It all weighed too heavy for even the mighty Captain America. 

Steve didn't notice his own tears until you had pulled back from his chest and lifted hand to his cheek. Your fingers barely grazed his skin as you wiped one away. Trails of tears stained your face, leading up to puffy red eyes. But the warmth had returned to them. You didn’t look hollow anymore. His own hand lifted, cupping your jaw and brushing a tear into your skin. He felt like he was going to lose himself in your eyes, the way they held so much in them. Everything you were feeling was flashing in your irises. Creasing your eyebrows together a little. You looked tired, worn out, but more yourself than you had been for a while. The roughness of his beard against your palm was grounding you in the moment. All of his attention was focuses so intently on you, like he was looking past just what was on your surface and seeing the parts of you that you’d rather hide. 

Neither one of you wanted to break the moment you had found yourselves in. You were both so close. Both feeling for each other and with each other. And if it had been a movie then you were sure this was the moment when you’d be reaching for his face. Pulling him in a for a kiss. But it wasn’t. You were two broken people sitting in the middle of sparring mat, crying to each other. A long sigh escaped out of you as you dropped your hand from his face and tucked yourself back against his chest. You couldn’t admit to yourself that you wanted the movie moment, but you also weren’t ready to let him go either. He seemed to understand as he wrapped his arms around you. One of his hands found your arms and gently rubbed circles into while you fell asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, not sorry!


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this one is so short, but I wanted this part to stand on its own. Also, Laura is Clint's sister here. I liked her just not as his secret wife.

Sunlight streamed in through the large windows at the end of your room. You tried to squint it away and go back to sleep to no avail. Today was the day to fix things, to apologize for the past few days. Determinedly, you rolled out of bed, searching the nightstand to find the time but were stopped by a note tucked under the lamp. The words on it were neat, slanted letters, ‘I hope you slept well. We’re here for you when you’re ready. — Steve’. The gesture pulled at a place in your chest. Of course, Captain Old Fashioned would leave a sweet note for you to wake up to. A small amount of doubt crept in of the bubble of happiness, you were worried about where things were between the two of you since last night. You both hadn’t always been good at not starting fights and things had been getting much better recently. But you had actively hurt him just hours ago. Like you had done to Natasha. Then you had shut them all out. The progress you had made. The small, odd family you had formed could be entirely different now. Teeth worried your bottom lip as you thought about the damage you had done. 

Before anything else, you needed a shower. It took almost half an hour to comb through the mess that had accumulated on top of your head. The next hour was spent just trying to convince yourself to leave the shower. Knots that you hadn’t even noticed pulled at each other as you had tried to scrub away the last few days off of your skin. You turned the dial farther and farther to the left, forcing hotter water to spray out onto you. The emptiness in your chest slowly closing as you forced yourself to feel it. Water pounding against your back distracted your mind from overthinking. Everything felt like it was leaving you and sliding down the drain to be forgotten. Eventually, you managed to slowly piece yourself together. Fix your hair. Take a shower. Get dressed. And breathe. You eyed the woman in the mirror across from you. She looked rough. Dark circles still marred the underside of her eyes, mixing with the swelling from having cried all night. Her skin was blotchy from lack of care and then having spent too long under almost boiling water. But a small part of you was peeking out from behind your eyes. The woman who wanted to be the fixer for everyone else. To do better. 

Doing better was easier said than done. You trekked your way to the kitchen, in hopes of eating before you ran into anyone. Instead, you walked into what looked a bit like a snowstorm. Almost every surface in the room was covered by a fine layer of what looked to be flour. Natasha and Sam, covered head to toe in the white dust, both stood at the epicenter of the mess yelling at each other like children, while Steve was brushing himself off with an unamused look to the side. 

“I told you to put the beaters all the way in!” Natasha snapped at Sam. 

“And I told you we needed to put the eggs in before you turned it on!” He threw back. 

“If the fucking beaters had been in, then this wouldn’t have been a problem!” 

“If you stepped off and let me do it then it wouldn’t have been a problem!” 

“I’m about to show you a fucking problem,” Natasha hissed while getting up in Sam’s face. 

“Children, children, no bloodshed in the kitchen,” you interjected before Natasha actually considered killing Sam. All three pairs of eyes landed you on. For a moment you felt like running. You had been so rude to all of them, and here you were jumping into the middle of them having fun. But you should have expected them to not let you. A snarky are you done with your little hissy fit and look what the cat dragged in left the both of them. 

Natasha waltzed up in front of you, with her arms crossed over her chest, like she was sizing you up, “You look like shit.” As hard as she was trying to conceal it, you could feel her amusement sitting just under her pretend indifference. 

Your eyes rolled on their own at her. “Take a look at yourself,” you motioned to her entire self, covered in flour. A bark of laughter erupted out of her as her arms wound their way around you. Sam inserted himself into the hug a moment later while calling you a punk. 

As they pulled away from you, laughing at the fact that you were now also part of the snow storm, Sam started, “Steve said you guys—“ 

“I told them you’d probably be feeling better and that with how much you like group dinners maybe we try a breakfast,” he added calmly with an easy smile you hadn’t ever noticed cross his face before. He had reminded on the other side of the kitchen, letting the three of you have a moment. Some rogue part of you wished he’d step around the counter and give you a hug too, but you knew that wasn’t going to happen. You tried to crush that feeling down. Steve had been there for you when you needed it. 

“So, you all decided on a dust storm for breakfast?” You asked, trying to pull your attention form Steve. The comment refocusing Natasha and Sam on their earlier yelling match, resulting in the bickering you had walked into starting up again with a reinvigorated fury. 

“No, it was supposed to be pancakes, but somebody doesn’t know how to work a mixer,” Natasha snarked coolly at Sam. The two of them continued to argue as they resumed their attempt at pancakes. You found a seat at the breakfast var, scooting unto one of the stools and enjoyed watching the chaos. A wave a warmth behind you pulled your attention from the two, as you felt Steve set a hand on the back of your stool. Nerves you didn’t even know existed came alive just under your skin, driving your heart to start fluttering in your chest. As if the lack space between the two of you was normal, he settled in just behind your shoulder. 

He chuckled a little at the antics the others are pulling with each other, “It’s nice to see them relax. They used to do with when we lived at the tower.” You tried to remain unfazed by his proximity, instead focusing on what he’s saying. The way his clear voice felt like balm on your blistered feelings. 

“It's funny to see super spy Natasha Romanoff so riled up about pancake batter,” you laugh back at him, digging down deep in yourself to pull an ounce of steadiness into your voice. 

He looked down at you, “You should see her and Barton together. They either are an impossible duo to take down, or their own worst enemy.” 

You were so tempted to lean back into his chest, “Barton? Clint, right? Isn’t he retired?” 

He shifted a little bit, just barely closer, as his other hand planted next to you on the marble counter. Callouses covered each of his knuckles and the pads of his finger. The way they had dragged across your arms the night before, resurfaced in your mind, driving your heart rate from a flutter to a gallop. He answered, unaware of how he was silently tormenting you, “Yeah, his sister has a farm out in the middle of nowhere. After her husband passed away, he left to go help her with the kids. It’s the life he always wanted. Although I’m sure he’d love to have Nat there with him.” 

“It sounds like there’s more there. Why isn’t she out with him?” You asked, interested, and maybe trying to focus on something other than the cologne wrapping around you. It was a little clean at first, ending in a hidden spicy note. 

When he didn't respond right away, you worried maybe you had pushed too far. Tested his openness to much. Leaning back slightly, ever so aware of how close he was, you tipped your head up to his face. His eyebrows were drawn together as he was thinking. But he didn’t move from behind you, and finally answered, “She made a sacrifice for the team, but it really hurt Clint. When everything… returned to normal I think she couldn’t forgive herself.” Your eyes drifted from Steve’s face to watch the red head in front of you, her sad eyes and distant stare seemed to make more sense. 

“Did he?” The question that fell out of your mouth felt like it wasn’t just about Natasha and Clint. Maybe about another pair who had been hurt again and again. Who had made choices that hurt the other. You felt a wave of uncertainty come from Steve, and you closed your eyes trying to prepare for him to move away. He had caught on to what you hadn’t asked him. About the night before. Did he forgive you for what happened? For taking you pain, quite literally, out on him. The beating of your heart stuttered. Nothing had even happened between you two, and you already felt like his answer was going to crush you. That had to be why it was called a crush. 

“I think he did,” he almost whispered. It took you by surprise, Steve Rogers was always so sure about himself. You had never heard him be quiet. In the same moment his hand that had been balanced on the backrest of your stool, moved and landed near your waist. His fingers wrapped from just below your ribs with his palm ending near your spine, and it burned were he touched you. Bright and hot, like a brand. Not like the pain from the night before, but something pleasant. Something that felt like living. A gentle squeeze let you know he had done it on purpose. 

That was the minute that the pancakes were almost done. Natasha had turned to tell you guys to grab plates but caught the two of you. She tracked Steve’s arm that fell behind you, noticing the fingers sneaking around your ribcage. Her elbow snapped up, digging into Sam’s side. It caused him to grunt and look at her ready to fight. Until he noticed her watching you and Steve. He could see the look on Steve’s face, one he was sure could have been called smitten, if you were back in the olden days. They both return to the pancakes, letting you two have the moment. They shot each other devilish glances; things were going to become very interesting. 

You lifted your face to try and see his, catching a view mostly of the bottom of his jaw. He had returned his focus to the apparent children making pancakes. Both were taking turns driving their elbows harder and harder into the other’s side. But his hand hadn’t moved. It was still so warm against your side, warmth sparking something deep in you. And you hoped maybe in him. Trepidation hid under the amusement Steve was letting off from watching his friends continue to playfully bicker. It was so light, that if you hadn’t been paying attention to it, then it would have been washed away. Your own head was swimming with feelings; worry, hope, uncertainty. The man behind you had let himself open up to you and you had done the same in return. Could whatever this was become a small flame of joy in the midst of the remaining pain? Could you have it?


	10. Chapter 10

No one in the building really used FRIDAY, it wasn’t like anyone was ever really searching for someone else or there was something that needed to be communicated right away that couldn’t be done using a phone. The only exception that that rule, was Nick Fury. He had been back at the compound twice since he’d rather unceremoniously dropped you off. Each time he had requested for FRIDAY to get everyone into a meeting room. Which was why you were so surprised to see him strolling through the West wing with no announcement.

“Fury?”

“Board room in five. Do not be late.” Had been his only reply as he strode right on past you. 

When he showed up, things happened. Personally, you had never been on the receiving end of one of Fury’s summons, but it had been funny to watch people scramble to beat him to meetings. Walking into the room, you were surprised to see only Steve, Natasha, and Sam seated on one side of the table, with Fury on the other. Normally the room would be filled to the brim with people. Now it was just the five of you. Fury had never directly spoken to you during a meeting, instead he had always just referred to the three already seated, Steve in the middle of the other two. You planted yourself between Steve and Natasha, leaning against the wood paneled wall. Fury had yet to acknowledge any of you, his focus was directed to several open files in front of him. Finally, he sighed a long, dramatic breathe out through his mouth, “It’s time the lot of you start being part of the world again.”

Your eyebrows shot up across your forehead. This was not the conversation you had expected to be carried out today. Waves of mixed emotions poured off the three infant of you. You caught a frown pull across Sam’s face in your periphery. Natasha’s face remained stoic, not letting any of her feelings be conveyed. From where you were standing, you couldn’t see Steve’s face, but you did see his shoulders tense. His whole body becoming rigid. “Fury—“ a warning started to come out of the man in front of you.

“You all have had your time. I cant keep throwing agents and a kid at some of the threats we’re facing.” You assumed the kid was Spiderman, who you knew very little of. “Barnes and Maximoff have agreed with Romanoff here, and are ready to come back,” he continued. That also surprised you. Natasha had mentioned she was trying to get Wanda to leave isolation and to help you with your abilities. But Fury’s phrasing sounded like they were coming back for more than just that. He had also, very effectively thrown Natasha under the boat. 

“The last few times we have gotten involved with things, people turned on us,” Steve stated in a gravely tone.

“And then you all saved the world,” Fury retorted, sounding like he was already bored with the conversation.

A long sigh left Steve, like he was deflating, “If they want to come back then they should. But it’s their choice.” Agitation tinged his voice, making it sound like his throat was closing up. 

Something like a smile crossed Fury’s face, although a smile seemed too nice for the expression, “They have both signed off already.”

All three heads in front of you snapped up to look at him. Sam and Natasha both looked happy. You could see a lopsided smile pull across Sam’s face. Nat looked like a little bit of the weight on her shoulders was lifted off. Their missing pieces wanted to come home. If it hadn’t been so sad, their shock at Fury’s words might have been comical. Fury paid them no attention as he dropped his working eye to the pages in front of him, “The three of you will be preparing to negotiate the terms of the Avenger’s duties and operations. There is a summit set in Wakanda in three months, where as a collective whole, you will decide your futures with the UN.”

Silence reverberated around the room. 

Continuing, Fury added, “Which leaves vacancies here at the compound that will need fulfilled as we move forward.” He looked up over Steve’s head and focused on you, “As I have seen, you are already handling administrative work. Add training for the new round of greenies onto that-“

“That is not a good idea,” Steve cut in. Your eyes snapped from Fury’s face to the back of Steve’s head. His words felt like a punch in the gut. Why was that not a good idea?

“Fury, she is not ready for that. She doesn’t train with her own recruitment group, having her lead a new one is not happening. Her abilities are still not controlled. And she is not here to be an agent. She’s here for protection.” Each sentence felt like a slap across the face. The agitation in his voice grew as he stood up, cutting you off from Fury’s view. Effectively isolating you behind him. Natasha’s eyes widened in surprise, they snapped to your face around Steve’s hulking form. Sam on the other side had sat back in shock. More surprise permitted the room, mixing poorly with Steve’s rising anger.

For a moment no one said anything. The traitorous words hung in the air. 

On the other side of the super solider, Fury continued, “Well it looks like it’s a time of change for everyone.” He pinned Steve with a look of annoyance and called past him, he attention back to you, “Do you think you can handle this?”

The pain of Steve’s words simmered in your core, turning into anger. Here you were back to square one and ready to kill him. Ready to make him eat his god damn words. Just like when you had started training.

“Yes I am,” you ground out. With each one you push the feelings bubbling under you skin at the man in front of you. 

Betrayal. Thats what you felt. The betrayal of someone who had been there for you, only to cut you down in front of everyone. He must have caught a pass of your anger, or maybe he just needed to keep cutting you down because he turned and zeroed in on your face. All of his features were twisted. Gone was the soft kindness you had started to recognize in his eyes. 

“Do not. You know this is a bad idea. You aren’t ready.” Everything coming out of his mouth sounded clipped. Warped.

“And I am a big girl who can make my own decisions,” you spit out at him.

“What happens when you put some kid out on their ass like you did to Natasha, huh?” He threw a large hand out in her direction to emphasize his point. The memory of Natasha dropping to the mat in pain that you had caused, flashed in your head. Your eyes snapped shut and you shook your head to try and make it go away. 

“You didn’t come here to be a hero, you came here to hide. So don’t start now,” his last words sucked the wind out of your lungs. He was so close. Towering over you. The blues of his eyes had disappeared in the the shadows of his faced caused by how low his eyebrows had pulled down. It was the same look he had given you when you had first walked into the compound. You felt the cold walls around him raising, he effectively shut you out again. But you didn't need your powers to tell you how he was feeling. His chest expanded in deep breaths as he continued to stare down at you. 

Your palms itched. Waves of anger causing power to build in your finger tips. Without thinking you slam your hands into his broad chest, allowing only enough power out to make it sting. “Fuck you! Fuck you Rogers!”

As you rear back to slam them against him again, he caught both of your wrists and takes another step closer to you. His hands wrap completely around your arms and he holds you in place. All of the gentle touches you had received seemed to far away. Seemed like a lie when suddenly his hands felt like they were about to crush you. You jerk back trying to force him to release his hold on you, but he only tightens it. 

The anger boils over. Your eyes find his, and for a split second you catch something like fear in his before they harden again. Anger wells up and rushes down your arms, but you remain intentional. Just enough to make him pull away form you, not to send him across the room. His chest rises and falls rapidly, still glowering down at you. As his mouth opens to say something else, “Y/N-“

“I am in control,” you hiss at him. 

One step to your left takes you out of his line of sight, “I am ready, I don’t need protected anymore.” Your words are directed at Fury, but Steve seems most effected by them.

With that you turn your back on the man next to you and walk out of the room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am sorry for being gone! And sorry for the whiplash!


End file.
